to be seen is difficult

choosing to be seen is choosing for love

The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012)

we are all prisoners of our own minds. they are built from how we think we are perceived, designed by what we have been told, or at least, by what we have survived.

mine was a silent cage, imprisoning me to stay in the background. believing that i am a wallflower. a stubborn, strong one to break through. to be the quiet kid with sealed mouth and wandering eyes, disappearing into the walls.

i noticed everything. the birds flying high, the flowers blooming, the bugs crawling, the wind shifting, the sound of your voice deepening, the fresh scar on your right thigh, your hair growing longer, the mole under your eye, and the eyes swollen from last night’s tears. i noticed every single thing but i kept it to myself.

i thought, “they were trying so hard to look okay, i should respect that and say nothing”.

i thought caring like that was a crime.

so i swallowed my knowing, because to know, to see, and to understand them, unintentionally, felt wrong. it was a crime i was scared to commit, the crime i was taught to avoid.

growing up, attention always felt conditional. good grades, to be the bigger person, obedience, and ‘easy to handle’ were rewarded with acknowledgement. there was no room to be known or accepted for being messy and silly. to cry was a sign of weakness. speaking out of turn was a sign of misbehavior. then you picked up the habit and it became easy to excel at disappearing in plain sight to feel safe. because when no one sees you, no one can reject you.

now i see that i was just projecting myself onto everyone: the desire to become unnoticed, to disappear without a trace, to never be attached— they are all fear and ease. it was simpler to not let people know me. no expectations, no explanations, no risk of disapppointment. in return, i made myself believe that nobody knew me and nothing felt safer than this. i told myself this is what i preferred — that i didn’t mind to not being considered, to not being chosen, to not being preferred, and obviously to not being seen.

no one knew i don’t enjoy soupy meals. that i prefer the color pink over blue. that i would never say no to karaoke. that i think i don’t matter. that i hate being alone. that i like cats, love cold weather, and always choose tea over coffee. this is the list that i don’t expect people to know because i made it easy not to. the same thing i do to people.

i let my heart stay cold, stuck in the same motion, locked in the same room. i kept everyone at arm’s length—for control, for ease, with the price of self-erasure. i didn’t just forget about them, but i also forgot about myself. i didn’t remember names, faces, even versions of myself at the time. did i ever tell them i appreciate them? did i ever let them know that i had bad days too? did i ever say what i wanted? did i ever ask that i want them to stay?

i was never truly existing, i was just a passerby in my own story. my distance didn’t really protect me, it betrayed me of the life and joy i could have. without being seen, there was no trace of who i was for the people i crossed paths with. they didn’t know me, nor did i know myself. at some point, it was no longer a rejection to be seen, but it was becoming a rejection of love.

the love that requires sincerity, honesty, and vulnerability. love is very soft and very exposing. it asks you to hold it with both hands, gently, without certainty, without the promise that it will last. love can’t survive performance and it definitely can’t breathe in a soul covered with masks. love can only grow where there is truth, even if they are not pretty, messy, or difficult.

because to be loved is to be seen.

i think i’m growing tired of the prison i was in. because i am learning, slowly and imperfectly, to let myself be known and to believe that i matter too.

i should’ve realized sooner that i was letting it in, like when someone made me the snack i love after i casually mentioned it during a lunch conversation. or when someone poured me tea even when they were making coffee for themselves. or when they excitedly offered to take pictures of me because i enjoy it. or when someone bought a birthday cookie instead of a cake, because i told them how much i was craving for a cookie at the time.

but the moment that really hit me was when three people, on three separate occasions, asked me the same thing: “did you just cry?”

i swear i was laughing and conversing, standing there, looking like my usual self. but they saw it. they all saw me.

i never had to worry about showing up after crying because nobody ever asked. i was convinced it was either that 1) they noticed but they didn’t want to say anything, or 2) they just never noticed. that was okay. i would do the same.

but somehow, i guess the distance made my heart grow fonder over the years and i started to learn that: being seen is not a threat anymore. i start to accept that people see me the way that i see them, and they let me know. they didn’t ask me that question out of pity. i know it was not to expose me, but it was a recognition. to be exact, it was love, wrapped in attention.

this kind of recognition is strange, still. i have to learn to get used to it. some of us learn that to be seen is not safe. it is giving them space to reject us and i think the problem is not the rejection itself, but rather the fear. that there is a fear if i am too much, i will not be considered anymore. if i show myself more, i will be a ‘difficult’ person. the fear of being disliked for who i am. because with distance, their disinterest won’t affect me. in distance, their lack of knowing is just another thursday. in distance, they turn away for the mask i intentionally wear for them.

but the truth is, we all know that to love takes courage, but to accept it? that takes just as much, if not more. i guess my other crime was also not knowing that i could be loved when i am not even trying to perform. when it has always been this easy, this soft, this messy.

maybe that is why everything starting to matter more for me. people are not just faces in the crowd anymore. their stories are not just words floating in the air anymore. i am slowly letting myself being seen by letting people in. being seen still brings a thump on my chest, but it is the kind of thump that reminds me that i am real and i exist right here, right now. there is someone paying attention, a witness for my existence.

with being seen, maybe there is a risk of losing control or being misunderstood. but this is the risk that i prefer to take. i know that i would rather be known imperfectly than hidden away completely. i want to be remembered—and i want to remember this too. it is okay to admit that, yes, i cried last night from the heartbroken i still have from months ago. and yes, i will stay even when i have always been good at leaving.

and maybe being seen is how we can reveal what has always been true. we learn to accept that not everyone will stay, but the ones who do, will do it with their eyes open. they know who you are and they accept you. they notice you, they remember you, and they hold you in many ways you didn’t know you needed. that is when you finally realized, that connection was never about earning love, it was about letting yourself be real long enough for someone to finally reach for you.

don’t get me wrong, because i am still learning how to sit with it, how to be held by someone. but again, if to be seen is the price of connection and to remember, i have no problem paying it. this is the time when i break free from my prison: when i finally choose to be found, to be loved, to be seen.

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