peace was quiet, until i realized i was hiding in it

i mistook my peace

(This was in my drafts for a long time, but i’m posting it anyway)

i don’t even know how many people will relate to this feeling but yeah!

for the longest time, my only surviving strategy was simple. It was peace over everything.

back when the depression was so heavy that just waking up felt like carrying a heavy rock on my chest, i needed an escape. my brain was a war, and i was completely exgausted. so, i built a fortress around me. my definition of peace was brutal in its simplicity. ignore everyone. ignore everything. do whatever comforted me, whatever kept the noise out.

if a text felt too heavy? ignored. if a responsibility required actual effort? ignored. if someone muttered something sharp or judgmental about me? muted, blocked, pretended it didn’t exist. i thought i was unlocking some great level of emotional detachment. i walked around telling myself i was at zen, wrapped in my little bubble of absolute nothingness.

i was a performance artist in an empty theater, waiting for an audience that never showed up. except, my performance wasn’t for others. it was for myself, pretending that avoidance was enlightenment. i sat up straighter, narrowed my eyes at my screen, and waited for the world to notice how effortlessly unbothered i was. nobody ever came.

to tell you the truth, i didn’t realize the horrible sound of my own jangling until some weeks ago

the illusion broke completely when i finally looked up from my screen and realized something terrifying. i was behind. i was miles behind where time kept moving, while i was sitting still in my cozy, stagnant comfort zone. i had weaponized peace just to run away from hard things, hard responsibilities, and truths.

here is the part nobody tells you. the world is full of noise, and you cannot ghost your way through life forever.

i thought true peace meant an empty room where no one could ever touch me. but an empty room isn’t peace. i realized it’s called isolation.

if your calm shatters the second someone looks at you the wrong way, it was never peace to begin with. it was just temporary anesthesia.

the truth is, this world is full of bad people, full of judgment, and full of friction that you cannot simply mute away. i realized that ignoring bad things and dodging tasks i didn’t want to do wasn’t fixing anything. it was just pausing my life while the rest of the clock ticked forward. i need to learn how to live within that noise. i need to figure out how to cooperate with difficult people and navigate a messy room without letting it completely swallow me whole.

i’m learning, slowly and with a lot of leftover anxiety, that real peace isn’t about running away from the mess. it’s about learning how to carry your own quiet right through the middle of the chaos. it’s letting people judge you without making it your problem. it’s doing the tedious, heavy work you’ve been putting off because self respect tastes a lot better than temporary ease.

i’m soooo done hiding in this so called bubble. i want the kind of peace that actually survives the noise. and i will worf for it.

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