For a very long time, I hated myself; I saw an ugly face, an awkward person and a voice with no importance. Every time I said something extremely unfunny or I just expressed myself a little too much, I felt a wave of shame flash over me that I couldn’t swim through. I felt it when I was with friends or family, a never-ending voice telling me who I was: a bad person.
Then, my inner voice told me my worth, and I believed it. In the mirror all I could see were the flaws that I had created repeated back in my reflection. I became less honest about my emotions and started to isolate myself from those I loved until I became depressed. There were only a few people I was honest with, yet I still took everything they said as a personal attack on who I was.
I would anxiously sit with groups of friends who hardly knew me because of how closed off I had become. It was frustrating to never be picked first by others because no one was actually able to connect with me. The more and more time I spent isolating myself, the harder it was to separate whether my voice was only mirroring how I was being treated, or how I treated myself.
A lot of people feel that shame and embarrassment that curls around their lungs, making it hard to breathe. Sometimes it’s tests at school, but other times it’s just words that feel like they are flying out of my mouth without control. Maybe the mortification is not so extreme, but I still feel embarrassment that’s hard to push down.
I would paint on a fake smile and pretend I was okay when inside I felt numb and detached. From my friends’ perspectives, I wasn’t pretending; I was just less confident than I used to be. The little voice in my head would ask me if growing up meant that the magic of who I was would dissolve into something more conventional.
I hated that voice, the one that was telling me who I was and wasn’t. It had a mantra for me: “you are not good enough.” It repeated it over and over in my head, and every time I messed up a little, I heard it: “you’re not good enough” until it was not just that subconscious voice in my head telling me who I was, but the rest of me believed in it too.
We all have this voice, whether we acknowledge it or not, and it can pin us into a corner full of only shadows. Maybe you don’t process it, but there is something about each of us, whether it be inner or outer, that we dislike about ourselves. It’s like a scab stuck to your skin, no matter how much you pick at its still there, just now its a raw, open wound.
On the way home from school one day, my mom brought up my depression. I remember becoming angry and defensive because I didn’t think I was depressed. I lay on my bed later, wondering why I felt this way. I didn’t acknowledge she was right until later on, but at that moment, I was able to realize that I was sad. I felt far away. I was constantly overwhelmed and felt like my head was overflowing with emotions. Other times, I felt like I was watching my life from the clouds.
I’ve gone to therapy since I was in 6th grade, but over time, I’ve done a lot of work with my therapist and by myself to get to a place where that voice was smaller. During this process, my mom reminded me that if I put in the work, you will get paid eventually. I couldn’t fathom a time when the heaviness inside of me would go away, but I started to remind myself that the emotional work I was doing would, eventually, pay off.
It’s taken me time to understand that the voice we all have is not who we are. The insecurity and fear it causes are real, and they hurt, but that doesn’t mean they’re true. Very slowly, I started to process that to change the way I talked to myself, I couldn’t just ignore those feelings. I needed to process them and remind myself who I am. We are not those voices. We are how we treat others, our morals, and how we express ourselves as individuals.
I started to speak to myself differently; I acknowledged what I loved about myself and what I was proud of. Very slowly, that became my subconscious voice. Not that I was bad, or stupid, or lazy, but that I was a good person.
