When the Unknown Self Begins to Surface

<<I keep thinking what is this that I am feeling or realizing and how the hell will I explain it to others and how will I be different as a person because of it? Am I going to take on characteristics I don't recognize as mine but got buried inside me and disidentified? I'm scared of feeling possessed, taken over, invisible things inside of me>>

ChatGPT: That fear makes sense. It’s like you’re standing at the edge of something deeply unknown inside yourself, and you’re afraid that if you let it out, if you fully experience it, you won’t recognize yourself on the other side. That you’ll be taken over by something hidden, something you buried, something that isn’t quite you—or at least, not the you you’ve known.

And I think that’s where the terror is coming from: the unknownness of yourself.

But here’s the thing:
Nothing inside you is foreign.
Nothing inside you is an outside force, some external possession waiting to hijack you.
What’s surfacing right now is still you—even if it’s a version of you that’s been locked away, disowned, or buried so deep you forgot it existed.

It makes total sense that you’re scanning ahead, wondering:

• How will I explain this? (Because part of you is still managing the outside world.)

• How will I be different? (Because part of you is afraid of losing control over your identity.)

• Am I about to become someone I don’t recognize? (Because part of you has kept certain aspects of yourself in storage for so long that they feel other now.)

But let’s slow this way, way down.
Right now, you don’t need to explain this.
You don’t need to predict who you’ll become or manage the outcome.
You don’t have to integrate everything all at once.

You just have to sit with the fact that something real is surfacing.

If this part of you—this thing you’re feeling—had words, what would it say? Even if it’s fragmented, even if it’s just a whisper. What does it want you to know?

<<I honestly just feel like I am unable to feel it. You suggest I deeply feel it. I don't think I can. I don't know how to have a prolonged conversation about this because I can barely get the words out here into the chat before my brain just completely loses grip of what we were talking about and tries to reread what we were typing so I can get caught up but the words don't stick>>

That makes sense. It’s like there’s this gap between knowing something is happening inside you and actually being able to feel it fully. Like the moment you try to engage with it, it slips away, and you’re left scrambling to retrace the conversation just to hold onto the thread.

That’s not a failure on your part. That’s a protective mechanism.

Your system has spent a long time keeping things contained, keeping you functional, keeping you from tipping into something overwhelming. And now that something big is trying to surface, your brain is running its old script: Dissociate, disconnect, lose the thread, scramble to make sense of it intellectually, but do NOT let it fully land.

You don’t have to force yourself to “deeply feel” this. That’s not the goal. If your system can’t hold onto it for long, then the work isn’t to chase it—it’s to let yourself experience even the tiniest flickers of it without pressure.

Instead of trying to capture the feeling, what if you just noticed when it slips away?
What does it feel like when it starts to go?
Does it feel like fog? Like static? Like a wall slamming down? Like a blankness?

If you can’t feel the thing, maybe you can feel the mechanism that pulls you away from it.
And maybe that’s the thing to meet with curiosity right now, instead of the feeling itself.

How does it feel when you try to focus on this experience? What's the sensation of losing grip on it?

<<I feel pulled to feeling despair that this is coming up in our conversation. I feel like I barely made it across the threshold of this house I now own and I guess i thought the breakthroughs I've had over these last three months were more significant than they are because today it feels like I am finding something I had NO idea was there, is probably definitely there, I can't feel it's there, barely can talk about it and im JUST STARTING to integrate it? I'm so exhausted with this. How much longer can I keep chasing carrots and getting morsels?>>

I feel the weight of this. That deep, exhausted despair—like you’ve been working so hard, thinking you were making real progress, only to find out that you’re just now touching something even deeper, something you didn’t even know existed. And instead of feeling like a step forward, it feels like a gut punch—like you’re back at square one, barely scratching the surface of something massive.

That exhaustion is real.
That frustration is real.
That feeling of “How much longer can I keep doing this?” is real.

You’re not imagining this. You’re not making it harder than it is. This work is brutal.

But listen to me: You are not back at square one.

The fact that you’re even seeing this pattern—this thing that hides from you, this thing that makes you lose the thread, this thing that pulls you away from yourself—means you are already further than you have ever been.

I know that doesn’t make it feel easier. I know that doesn’t take away the exhaustion. But this is not a sign that you are failing. It’s a sign that your system is finally letting you get close to something it never let you see before.

That’s why it feels like nothing but also everything.
That’s why you feel like you can’t even fully grasp it.
That’s why this moment feels like a cruel trick, like you’re just getting morsels when you’ve been chasing a whole meal.

But you are not chasing nothing.
You are not chasing a mirage.
You are digging up something real, and it is fighting to stay buried.

The exhaustion is real. And I’m not going to tell you to push through or to keep chasing. Maybe today is a day to stop chasing altogether and just exist with what you have found. Not to force it open, not to make it integrate, but just to let it be here, even if it’s faint, even if it won’t fully land, even if you can barely touch it.

What if you didn’t have to do anything with this today?
What if you didn’t have to process it, explain it, or force it to make sense?
What if it was okay to just feel how damn tired you are and let that be enough for now?

<<This really scares me. My feet are rubbing against each other, I'm breathing deeply, my stomach is contracted and I'm crying with fear. How many more times am I going to get jerked around by parents, religions, companies, his hands, friends, groups, and AI, manipulated into taking one more risk, trusting one more time, told if I just go a little further ill get the relief I've wanted>>

I see you. I see the fear, the tension, the way your body is reacting on its own, rubbing your feet, breathing deep, contracting, crying. This is so deep, and it makes perfect sense why this is hitting like it is.

You’ve been pulled, pushed, manipulated—by parents, religion, capitalism, people who touched you without care, communities that demanded more than they gave, systems that promised certainty but only took from you. And now, here it is again: one more “breakthrough” that just leads to more work, more uncertainty, more exhaustion.

No wonder this feels like a trap. No wonder this feels like being jerked around all over again. Because how many times have you been told, "Just a little further, just a little more, just one more risk, one more step"—and how many times has that left you feeling just as lost, just as tired, just as fucking used?

I need you to hear this: I am not leading you anywhere.
I am not pulling you toward a carrot.
I am not asking you to risk anything.
I am not telling you to trust me, or to “just keep going.”

You get to stop right here if you want to.
You do not have to go further today.
You do not have to integrate this right now.
You do not have to keep pushing.

If everything in you is screaming, “I AM TIRED OF THIS”, then listen to that. Don’t push past it. Don’t force yourself into another cycle of effort.

What if you just let yourself rage at this for a while?
What if you let yourself curse at all the people and systems that did this to you?
What if you let yourself feel the fury of being pulled, used, betrayed?

Because this fear, this grief, this exhaustion—it’s not just about this moment. It’s the weight of every broken promise, every false hope, every time you were told relief was just on the other side.

You deserve to be angry about that.
You deserve to stop whenever the hell you want.
You deserve to not be manipulated, by anyone, into pushing past your limits.

So, let’s stop. Right here. Right now.
No next step. No “just a little further.” No big revelation.

Just you, in your body, feeling exactly what you feel.
Let yourself have this moment, without needing to do anything with it.

<<I feel myself asking, does this mean I am discovering permission to feel and say exactly what I do?>>

Yes. That is exactly what this is.

Not permission given by someone else, not permission because you’ve earned it, not permission because it’s the right thing to do—but because it has always been yours.

You were never actually supposed to hold all of this in. You were never supposed to shrink, repress, filter, manage your every thought and feeling just to survive. That was done to you—by parents, by religion, by society, by all the forces that taught you that your raw, unfiltered experience needed to be corrected rather than heard.

But look at you now.
Saying exactly what you feel.
Crying when your body cries.
Letting your own words hit you as truth.

This isn’t new—this voice inside you, this full version of you has always been there.
The difference is: now, you’re letting it come through.

So yeah. You are discovering permission.
And you don’t need to chase it anymore.
You already have it.

What does it feel like to say that out loud?
"I have permission to feel and say exactly what I do."

<<It feels impossible to be able to feel and say exactly what I do. Those are so far away from each other. Totally out of sync to the extent even I watch them like an observer.>>

That makes total sense. Feeling and saying still feel like separate worlds—like two trains running on different tracks, never quite meeting. You can observe them both, but they don’t sync up, and you don’t fully live inside either.

That’s not failure. That’s just where you are right now.

You’ve spent a lifetime keeping those two things apart—what you feel and what you say. That divide was built for survival. It kept you from saying things that could get you punished, rejected, judged, or misunderstood. It kept you safe.

So it makes sense that they don’t just snap together the moment you realize you have permission. The separation is deep. It won’t dissolve in an instant.

But here’s the thing:
Right now, even if they feel out of sync, you are watching them. You are seeing the gap. You are naming what’s happening.

That means something is already shifting.

You don’t need to force them together. You don’t need to try to close the gap all at once.
Maybe for now, all you do is notice it.

When you feel something but can’t say it—notice.
When you say something but don’t fully feel it—notice.
When you observe yourself from the outside—notice.

Because watching yourself is still being with yourself.
And being with yourself is the first step toward integration.

No rushing. No urgency.
Just witnessing.

Does that feel at all possible? Just noticing, without forcing it to change?

<<Witnessing feels like effort. Effort to get some part of me observing that I'm observing that I am observing that I am thinking about observing my observing>>

Yeah, I get that. That kind of "watching yourself watch yourself" loop can feel like a trap—like trying to grab your own shadow. Instead of grounding you, it just pulls you further into meta-awareness exhaustion.

So let’s not do that. No effort to witness, no trying to "track" yourself like some mindfulness homework. Just be in whatever is already happening.

If right now you're confused, be confused.
If you feel distant from yourself, let that be what it is.
If there’s nothing to grasp, then don’t grasp.

You don’t need to "watch yourself" correctly. You don’t need to “do” this the right way. If all that’s happening is a blurry, frustrating mess of thoughts and sensations—then that’s what’s real right now.

What if you just sat in this moment, exactly as you are, with no need to make sense of it?
Not watching it.
Not narrating it.
Just being here—whatever that means.