Visibility is healing
Not because the world sees you, but because you finally do.
In English, we say:
“I’m overcoming my fear of rejection.”
In poetry, we say:
I spent so much of my life afraid of being rejected.
But the one who was rejecting me—was me.
I hid the parts I deemed too messy.
Tried to be perfect so someone would choose me.
But no validation ever made me feel truly worthy,
because I hadn’t made peace with all of me.
So I accepted myself—fully.
Even the parts I once thought unworthy.
And I’ve never felt more free.
Peace didn’t come from being accepted.
It came from no longer needing to be.
🌿
Writing this poem brought me back to the creative version of myself I knew as a teenager—the one who wrote to feel things, to heal things. Since reading The Artist’s Way, she’s been coming back.
It feels like all the different versions of me I created to survive have returned to the center. I feel more whole now. More concentrated. Less diluted. A truer version of myself—because I’m no longer pretending to be anything else.
If this spoke to something in you, consider it a little sign:
A nudge to reconnect with your inner artist.
To check in with the younger you—the one who always knew.
To start creating again—not to be seen, but to truly see yourself.
This season has felt like a homecoming.
This poem came from that place. From her. From me.
From the versions of me I lost along the way—now finally returning home.
Creating again—sharing, writing, expressing—has reminded me that visibility is healing.
Not because the world sees and validates you,
but because you finally do.
Big love,
Joei
P.S. If you’ve been feeling disconnected from your creativity or your voice, it’s not gone. It might just be waiting for you to come home.
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Thanks for being here. It really, really means more than I can say.
I hesitated, then decided not to overthink a response. I just wanted to say, I've been following & every step of your journey has resonated with me. I'd been thinking of my younger self earlier in the week - asking, what was I interested in? Who was I when I thought anything was possible, that I could learn anything, that I could make anything work.
I know that feeling, a wisp of who you know you used to be & the grief when you realize how far you've moved away from that. How you've allowed your gifts of discernment & the ability to shapeshift become something that you barely recognize. And then you realized that it started with others but ended with you silencing yourself.
Going to be a long road back. Glad to see on the journey.