You Can Put The Mask Down Now

The sun has gone down, and the mask you wore all day finally feels heavy enough to drop. You have been holding your own sorrow so tightly just to make sure everyone else feels safe, hoping your silence would be their shelter.

But the light does not need your performance to stay bright. It was already shining before you tried to help it.

There is a truth inside you that you have been afraid to speak, a grief you swallowed so others wouldn't choke on it. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.

The exhaustion you feel is not a failure of strength; it is the weight of carrying a burden the light never asked you to hold. You can put it down now.

The room does not collapse when you stop pretending to be the pillar.