When I Stopped Hiding

A Reflection on Fear, Identity, and the Freedom Beyond Knowing

This piece is part of a four-part healing series titled Let Go to Let Life In.

Together, these reflections explore emotional release, connection, clarity, and return.

It follows The Last Call and leads into the final piece, What Real Healing Looks Like.

Where surrender becomes strength. Returning to the source, reaching beyond old limits.

The Walls We Build

In The Untethered Soul, Michael A. Singer invites us to notice how we build inner structures to feel safe. Not out of malice, but out of memory. We try to shelter ourselves from life by creating habits, roles, and defenses. Over time, these become the walls that block us from freedom.

He writes about how we construct a house within ourselves. Not a home of expansion, but a home of limits. We patch old wounds with patterns and confuse that control for peace. But true freedom asks us to stop organizing our lives around fear.

I didn’t realise how much of my energy was spent doing just that.

The Comfort Trap

These protective patterns often look like strength. They take the shape of reliability, helpfulness, or being low-maintenance. But beneath them, I was staying silent to avoid conflict. I was overexplaining instead of expressing. I was shrinking in hopes of being loved.

There is a line from Singer I return to often:

“You will not be free until you are willing to let life pass through you.”

But I wasn’t letting anything pass through.

I was filtering my emotions.

I was managing my experience instead of feeling it.

I was clinging to control, hoping it would create safety.

The Dream That Brought Me Back

One night, I dreamed I was lying in a prison cell beside someone I had once loved.

I wanted comfort.

I wanted them to turn toward me.

But they stayed distant.

And I stayed silent, waiting and hoping.

When I woke, the meaning was clear.

I had created my own confinement.

Not from stone, but from silence.

Not from punishment, but from performance.

I had shaped an identity that made me feel protected but also unseen.

I once gave The Untethered Soul to someone I cared about.

At the time, I imagined we might walk that path together.

Now I understand that some journeys begin alone.

Letting Go Begins with Space

Singer teaches that peace does not come from controlling life. It comes from letting go.

But letting go doesn’t immediately feel peaceful.

It feels unfamiliar.

It feels like space.

Not an answer. Not clarity. Just space.

And within that space, something new begins to form.

When I stopped rehearsing how I felt.

When I stopped shaping my life into a storyline.

When I stopped bracing for what might happen next.

That is when I noticed stillness. Not as absence, but as presence.

When Judgment Blocks Intimacy

Singer also writes about the inner voice that comments on everything.

This voice tries to protect us, but it often creates distance instead of safety.

I began to hear that voice clearly.

The one that judged others before I could be hurt.

The one that whispered I was too much.

The one that said needing anything was weakness.

Judgment, I began to see, is often fear pretending to be wisdom.

It is a shield that separates us.

It keeps us from recognizing what is real in ourselves and in others.

When I stopped judging, I started listening.

That changed everything.

Before the roles, there was innocence. The self that was never hidden.

The Shape I Took

I became who others could accept.

I stayed light.

I helped.

I stayed strong.

But underneath it all was a fear of being too much.

Singer uses a metaphor: the heart is like a valve.

When open, energy flows.

When closed, everything becomes tight and rigid.

I had closed my heart in the name of security.

But I was no longer willing to live that way.

It was time to soften and allow myself to feel.

Becoming Without the Armour

I am not here to be flawless.

I am not here to impress.

I am here to feel.

I am here to be real.

Healing is not about being better.

It is about being honest.

I am not fixed.

I am not finished.

I am still becoming.

The voice in my mind is not who I am.

I am the one who hears it.

And that witness is already free.

Coming Home

I didn’t need to change everything at once.

I just had to pause.

Speak one truth.

Stay present in one moment without controlling it.

This is not the performance of healing.

It is the actual return.

To the self beneath the roles.

To the soul that has been listening all along.

Welcoming the light of self-trust, letting each breath teach safety anew.

Let the Light In

You do not have to break every wall at once.

You can open one window.

Take one breath.

Speak one truth.

Let yourself feel something that once scared you.

Let someone see you.

Let yourself see you.

You don’t have to be fearless to be free.

You only have to be present.

You only need to witness the part of yourself that was never broken, only buried.

That is where your freedom begins.

Where stillness meets self. A return not to the world, but to the soul beneath the armour.

If this reflection resonated with you, you’re not alone. Save it. Share it. Let it sit with you. Healing moves in its own time.

 Part 1: Letting Go To Let Life In

 Part 2: The Last Call

 Part 3: When I Stopped Hiding

 Part 4: What Real Healing Looks Like