✦ The Day I Stopped Editing Myself

And why I’ll never go back to the well-behaved version of me again.

I used to write like I was being watched.

Scratch that — I used to live like I was being watched.
By strangers.
By ghosts of ex-friends.
By my mom.
By that one judgmental girl from middle school who probably isn’t even on the internet anymore but still haunts my nervous system like a goddamn shadow.

So everything I did was slightly…edited.

I’d write a caption and backspace the sentence that felt “too much.”
I’d delete posts that made me cry the next day because I didn’t want to seem too intense.
I’d turn anger into cleverness.
I’d turn heartbreak into aesthetics.

And I’d call it healing.

The Truth Filter

There was a version of me who thought she was honest.
And she was — kind of.
She told the truth, but only after it was dressed, powdered, and spiritually appropriate.

Not too angry.
Not too sad.
Not too chaotic.
Certainly not too much like a real woman unraveling in real time.

If my feelings were fire, I kept them candle-sized.
Neat. Contained. Instagrammable.

And every time I trimmed a piece of my truth to make it more palatable, a piece of me died a little.
I just didn’t notice it — because I was too busy being proud of how “aligned” I seemed.

When I Snapped (Softly)

I wish I could tell you the moment was cinematic.
Like I threw my laptop across the room and screamed, “I’M DONE PERFORMING!” and then burned a sage bundle the size of a toddler.

But no.

I just stared at a blog post one day, one I’d rewritten six different ways trying to make it “land,” and suddenly thought:

Fuck this.

Not in a ragey way. Not in defeat.

More like… sacred exhaustion.
Like my soul sighed and said,

“We’re not doing this anymore.”

What I Posted That Day

It wasn’t revolutionary.
It was just real.

Something about shame.
Something about being tired.
Something about how healing isn’t always graceful, and sometimes I just want to punch a wall and eat noodles in bed.

I didn’t format it.
Didn’t SEO it.
Didn’t put a bow on it.
I just hit publish.

And guess what?

The world didn’t implode.
People didn’t cancel me.
My inbox didn’t fill with hate mail.

But something did happen:

Someone messaged me and said, “I didn’t know anyone else felt like this. Thank you for saying it.”

And I cried.
Because that was what I’d been trying to manufacture through performance…
And it had only arrived when I let the mask drop.

The Addictive Nature of Authenticity

Once I got a taste of that?
Oh, I was hooked.

Not on validation — but on relief.

On the sensation of hitting “publish” and not regretting it
because I didn’t lie.
Didn’t perform.
Didn’t morph.

I just spoke.
And it was enough.

Let’s Be Honest: Most People Edit the Hell Out of Themselves

We shrink ourselves into:

Branded versions
Digestible quotes
Spiritual sound bites
Healing buzzwords
Whatever the hell sells

We speak like we’re auditioning.
We write like we’re applying for a job.

And it’s so damn exhausting.

What I Didn’t Know Would Happen

Here’s what no one warned me about:
When you stop editing yourself, you start losing people.

You lose the ones who liked you better quiet.
You lose the ones who fed off your self-doubt.
You lose the ones who liked the way you dimmed your magic to make them comfortable.

And you grieve that.

Even if it’s necessary.
Even if they were never really “yours” to begin with.

But You Also Gain Some Shit

When you stop editing yourself, you gain:

Better sleep.
Wilder writing.
Realer friendships.
Less stomach knots.
And a weird kind of power that whispers, “I don’t need your applause.”

You start to feel alive in a way that algorithms can’t reward.

Now I Write Like This

Now, when I write something, I ask myself:

Am I saying this to be liked?
Am I muting myself to avoid discomfort?
Am I hiding behind “professionalism” when I really just want to scream into the void?

And if the answer is yes — I rewrite it.
Not to make it softer, but to make it truer.

Sometimes it’s still scary.
Sometimes my inner critic goes full-court press.
Sometimes I still hover over “publish” like I’m disarming a bomb.

But I do it anyway.

Because I promised myself I’d stop editing the fire out of my voice.

So… What Changed?

Here’s what changed since I stopped filtering the hell out of my writing:

I found my actual audience — not just the one I thought I was supposed to attract
I stopped feeling sick after posting
I started creating for the version of me who never got to speak
I began making offers, courses, and blog posts that didn’t feel like a lie
And yeah… some people left. But my peace stayed.

Journal Prompts (for your own un-edited return)

Where am I still editing myself to be liked, hired, or not abandoned?
What parts of me feel “too much” — and who taught me that?
If I could say one thing online with zero consequences, what would it be?
What’s one story I haven’t told because I’m afraid of how it’ll be received?
What would it feel like to write the post before I make it perfect?