You Do Not Have to Shrink

The house is quiet now, and you are watching the people you love carefully lower their expectations for you. They think they are protecting your heart.

They think if they ask less, you will feel like less of a failure. But in this stillness, their kindness feels like a quiet giving up on who you really are.

You are not a project to be managed down to a safe size. There is a light within you that does not need their permission to shine, nor does it dim when they look away.

It was there before their disappointment, and it will be there after. The darkness has not overcome it.

You do not have to shrink to fit the space they have made for you tonight. The light is not a burden they have to carry; it is the breath you are taking right now.