The Perks of Being Invisible
By Z Zoccolante
I go to a conference with my best friend. Sometimes when I’m with her I feel as though we’re in a fish bubble of our very own, as though we create our own universe within the parameters of where our energy fields end. But I’m not invisible yet . . .
We do an exercise. For this one we partner with different people. Every time they break us into partners they tell us to go with someone new. We do not. And the more the exercises go on I feel as though they may be speaking in our direction, in our vicinity, to us? No, I’m mind reading now. The day before, one of the facilitators came over nice and sweet and asked me, Do you want to switch partners? I looked back and said simply, No.
There are times I wish I could record the micro, and then actual expressions, of humans. This was as though I’d told him that I’d just put a dead fish in his lunchbox; a mix between amusement and befuddlement. Like why would I do that, and why would I tell him? Maybe mixed with a little awe.
The exercise was working with two conflicted parts of ourselves and how to integrate them. As we went down the line the process had the client get to the root of what each part really wanted.
One of my parts started off by saying, to be left the f alone. Then my partner says, For what purpose? And I answer and we keep going like this for a while. It’s as though my brain throws me different words, words I’d never thought of. I find myself saying, Infinity, as one of the answers. What? Then I find myself saying, To be invisible.
For what purpose?
To feel connected. To be safe. To keep me from getting hurt. So I can be happy.
When the exercise ends I find the words I said fascinating. Invisible. I realize that – holy crap, that’s exactly what I tried to do with the two parts. In high school, I tried to make myself invisible by developing an eating disorder and I shrank away into myself. And then years later when something traumatic happened I holed myself away from the world in a tiny room for a period of time every day.
In essence, I tried to make myself invisible. To feel connected. To be safe. To keep me from not getting hurt. So I can be happy.
And bam, the realization hits me. Being invisible seems to have an end perk but it doesn’t really. Because if I try to make myself invisible from the world or other people I am really fighting the same thing we all want. Connection – to be happy.
This is a game changer. I don’t need to or want to go through energetically having to be invisible to get to what I really want.
The perks of being invisible end here, because they were always just a step to get me to happiness.
Forward Locomotion: Are there ways in which you hide in your own life? How do you try to remain invisible? This week think about those questions and see if you might be willing to them go.
With Love
Z ;)
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