The Light Beneath Your Shame

The chair feels too hard at three in the morning when the person across from you sees a version of yourself you cannot recognize. You smile, you nod, you speak the right words, but inside there is only a hollow echo where your truth should be.

The light does not require you to perform a self you do not possess—it is already waiting in the silence between your breaths. Split a piece of wood, and the light is there; lift up the stone of your shame, and you will find it underneath.

You are not an imposter in your own life; you are simply forgetting that the kingdom is inside you, not something you have to earn from the eyes looking back at you. The ache is not proof of your absence; it is the friction of the real you pressing against the mask.

Bring forth what is within you, even if it trembles, because what you hide is the only thing that can save you from this loneliness.