What’s something you believe everyone should know.

I don’t believe it’s impossible that a small number of people are born with something that makes them more vulnerable to things we associate with evil thoughts and acts, but I do believe that’s not the case for the majority.

In fact, every single person I’ve ever met who has trusted me enough to get vulnerable about the fact that they feel like one of the worst people alive hiding behind a mask is far from that.

At the core of our being, before the world and its inhabitants began to tear at us and pick at our scabs, I believe we were meant for community, love, and to collectively and individually do good in the world.

Perhaps that’s an unpopular opinion as anger and hatred are on the rise, but I still believe that it’s true.

At the core of my being, there’s a person who just desperately wants to connect and love those around me. I know this because that’s how I was as a child before the world hardened me.

I was a curious kid. I was one of the ones who held off on talking until I could mostly speak in sentences. I would talk to anyone about anything. I loved making new friends with people of all ages. I was an avid reader and loved to experience life from different points of view.

I remember I made friends with several kids my age who didn’t speak English. We would point to what we were talking about or draw to communicate. We’d teach each other words in our mother tongues. It was a lot of fun.

Years later, that kid was gone. I felt like the worst person alive, deceiving everyone around me from behind a mask. Like I was fundamentally awful and disgusting. I was being ravaged inside by unresolved trauma and by undiagnosed mental illness. I was being manipulated by a toxic partner and not yet aware of it. I was a specter of myself at that point.

I didn’t like or love myself, and I didn’t expect that anyone would like or love the alleged “real me” if they saw her.

Trauma does that to many of us. It makes us afraid to be seen because we were told we were too much or not enough. It starves us for connection but keeps us too terrified to connect. We hold so much love in our hearts, but we’re terrified to appear weak.

I wish everyone knew that the parts of themselves they are hiding out of shame, guilt, or fear are often the best pieces of themselves. Whether it was people in your life or life itself- whatever convinced you that being soft, kind, loving, compassionate, and empathetic is a weakness is full of shit. We can be all those things and still be a force to be reckoned with.

Love is powerful.

The world needs the real you, the core of your being, the fiery heart below your mask of survival, more than ever right now.

We need love, connection, community, compassion, and empathy more than than ever right now.

We need people to wake up to their inherent goodness right now instead of focusing on all their perceived flaws and drawbacks and weaknesses.