Are You Really Who You Say You Are?

Unraveling the space between image and identity

I’ve been sitting with something lately. Quietly. Uncomfortably.

It’s the kind of thought that doesn’t ask to be written but demands to be lived with first. It showed up when I caught myself describing the person I’m “trying to be.” The version of me I speak about in fragments. She’s softer. She breathes before reacting. She chooses herself every time. She reads more. She has boundaries like a well-constructed fence, white-painted, gentle, and not easily climbed.

But then I looked at how I moved through my day. How I spoke to myself in the mirror. How I made decisions, not from peace, but from fear. How I still bent, not because I wanted to, but because I didn’t know how to say no without apology.

And it hit me: I was talking like someone I wasn’t yet.

Not in a fake way. Not with bad intentions. But in a hopeful, image-building, let-me-paint-this-version-of-myself way. A version that felt good to say out loud. One that would earn a nod, a like, a “same.”

We do that a lot, don’t we? Speak our aspirations as if they’re facts. Try them on in public before we’ve stitched them into our skin. And we convince ourselves that saying it is the same as becoming it.

But it’s not.

There is a deep, aching gap between who we want to be and who we actually are, and healing begins when we stop pretending there isn’t.

We say we’re gentle, but we speak to ourselves like enemies.
We say we’re healed, but we flinch at the same wounds.
We say we’ve changed, but only because we haven’t been tested yet.

Here’s the truth: there is no shame in being in progress.

There is only harm in pretending you’re not.

It’s easier, sometimes, to live in the image. To post the soft words, quote the healing language, whisper affirmations through gritted teeth. But it’s not real until you stop needing to perform it. It’s not real until it shows up in the silence, when no one’s watching.

And yes, it’s scary to name what’s not working.

To say: I’m not there yet.
To admit: I still choose comfort over growth.
To confess: I speak about peace more than I practice it.

But that kind of honesty is sacred.

It’s the only way out.
You can’t fix a problem you refuse to name.
You can’t grow from a version of yourself you’re afraid to meet.
You can’t heal if you’re constantly hiding behind who you wish you were.

So I want to ask you, gently, but honestly:

Are you really who you say you are?

Not who you want to be.
Not who you perform.
Not who they think you are.

But the real, breathless you, underneath the words.

And if the answer is no, it’s okay. That’s not failure. That’s the beginning.
That’s where the work starts. That’s where the healing lives.
Not in the pretending, but in the truth.
I hope you’re brave enough to look at yourself, fully, gently, clearly, and stay.

We can’t become who we want to be until we’re willing to name who we are.

Speak it out loud.

You’re not alone.

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Next time, when the night gets too quiet, you’ll know where to find me—where the stars lean in, the porch light flickers, and the smoke keeps our secrets. - Cigarette talk