There are days when life feels like a performance. Wake up, get dressed, smile, talk, act like everything is normal. Act like you are normal. 😶🌫️
You go out, you meet people, you talk, you try to fit into the world the way you are supposed to. You keep the smile. You keep the “I’m alright.” You keep the mask on because it feels easier than explaining how you really feel. But after a while, it gets heavy.
You start feeling tired from the smiling. Tired from acting strong. There comes a point when you don’t want to see anyone. You don’t want to talk. You want to disappear from the constant “be social, be active, be fine.”
People love to look from the outside and make their own stories. If you’re not working, they think your life is easy. They imagine you sitting at home doing nothing, relaxing, chilling.
If only they knew. 🙄
Lately I’ve been trying to live more like a “normal” person. More activities. More going out. More communication. More smiling. And everyone sees that and thinks, “Oh, she’s fine now. Maya is okay.” But no. I’m not suddenly cured. My anxiety didn’t pack a suitcase and move out.
Inside, I still want to hide. I want to be in my room with my phone off, door closed, no noise, no pressure, no people expecting something from me. 🕯️
People think I’m free because I’m not working. But they don’t see the real picture. They don’t see me spending whole days — literally 16 hours — searching for jobs, scrolling through listings, filling forms, rewriting letters, dealing with pressure.
They don’t see me studying. And because everything is remote, they assume it’s nothing, they think it doesn’t count, they think I’m not doing anything. As if the knowledge just magically appears in my head. Honestly, try learn something new first — then talk about “easy”.
They don’t see me writing all my appointments and meetings in my calendar. Too many things. Too many demands.
They don’t see that social interactions drain me. Yes, I meet people. Yes, I talk. But I’m constantly pushing myself, acting okay even when I’m not.
And the worst part — people judge from a distance. “Oh, she’s not working. She’s doing nothing.” If only I could give them my brain for one day. They wouldn’t last two hours. 😤
Trying to survive every day is also work — the hardest kind, because no one sees it and no one understands it unless they’ve lived it.
Sometimes all I want is silence. Just a break from being “fine”.
And honestly? Not everything needs to be fixed today. Not every feeling needs to be explained. Sometimes we need silence more than advice. You’re allowed to choose yourself. 🌿