There’s something people never tell you about being understood.
It feels good at first. Like finally, someone sees you. Someone gets it. You become known, and maybe for the first time, you feel solid and defined. But no one warns you that being understood too quickly is a kind of trap. Because the moment people think they know you, they stop looking. And slowly, so do you.
You start playing the part they like best. You speak the lines that keep the peace. You begin trimming the parts of you that don’t fit the shape they’ve drawn. At first, it seems harmless. It’s just a word here, a truth there. Then one day, you wake up and realize you’ve become a summary of yourself. A simplified version. Perhaps, a tagline or perhaps, a role. And not because you aren’t more than that, but because it’s easier to be predictable. It feels safer.
But safety like that comes at a cost.
Because if you can be easily defined, you can be easily replaced.
That truth hits, I know.
It might land in your chest like a quiet ache. Because maybe you’ve spent years trying to be dependable and understandable. The kind of person people could rely on, call upon and lean on. Maybe you were proud of being “consistent.” And you should be. But not if it costs you the edges of yourself.
There is a danger in being known too soon, in being summarised too quickly. Not by strangers, but by people you love. Not because they’re trying to hurt you, but because everyone loves certainty more than they love change. And it’s hard to hold space for someone who refuses to be a single thing.
But you’re allowed to be confusing.
You’re allowed to shift.
You’re allowed to be someone who surprises even yourself.
Think of a coastline. From far away, it looks like a clean curve, like it follows some rule. But get closer and you’ll see it’s jagged, wild, shaped by time and storms and tides. Always changing, never exactly the same twice. And that’s why people keep coming back. Not for predictability, but for the wonder of it.
You are allowed to be like that. Unfixed and surprising. Maybe even a little messy. It doesn’t mean you’re lost. It means you’re living and changing, just like nature does.
So start doing things that don’t fit the version of you they know. Say yes to something strange. Say no to something expected. Make art that feels too weird. Rest when no one else is. Build things no one asked for. Burn the script you didn’t write but somehow ended up performing. Show them, and yourself, that you are more than one thing.
You don’t have to be a brand. You don’t have to be understood in one sentence. You just have to stay curious enough to keep becoming.
Do more things.
Not to prove anything.
Just to remember you still can.
Live more freely.
Not recklessly, but honestly.
The more unpredictable you are, the more irreplaceable you become. Not because you’re trying to stand out, but because you’re finally standing as yourself.
A lot of people here know me as a writer, but that is just one small part of my life now. It wasn’t always this way because there was a time when I spent so much time writing and ideating, but now, I have so much more I look forward to.
Every time I learn something new, I realize that there’s so much more to learn. So I try to keep learning whatever I can, from one thing to the next.
What I talk about in this blog is sort of like my mantra. I don’t want to be easily defined, so I do things that people think are unpredictable and erratic. I may not be good, but at least I won’t be the person who blends in with a crowd.
It’s not wrong to blend in, but it’s wrong if it feels safe.
