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A theme I’ve been noticing with many of my clients lately is how incredibly important status has become in how they view themselves. Status has quietly turned into a lens, one through which people interpret not only who they are, but how they believe the world sees them.
The frightening part about status is how easily it pulls us away from ourselves. Instead of asking,How do I feel? What do I want? Who am I? We begin asking,How do I look? How am I perceived? Am I enough in their eyes?We detach from our internal experience and attach ourselves to an imagined audience, curating who we are based on how we want to be seen.
We learn this early.
As children, we envy the classmate who seems to “have status.” The kid with the sneakers we’ve always wanted. The one whose friendships come easily to. The one everyone gathers around. Sometimes it’s even simpler—the kid with the biggest house.At our core, we all want the same thing: to be liked, to be accepted, to belong. In an ideal world, we would be liked and accepted for exactly who we are. But increasingly, we become attached to being liked and accepted for who others want us to be.
Somewhere along the way, we drifted.We stopped sitting across the table on a date wondering how we feel about the person in front of us. Instead, we obsess over what they must be thinking about us.We stopped choosing friends with whom we can be completely ourselves and started gravitating toward people who reflect who we think we should become.
When did we become so uncomfortable with simply being ourselves? With loving ourselves as we are? Right now, comfort lies in the mask. The mask protects us. It earns approval. It wins admiration. It keeps us safe from rejection. But here’s the paradox: the very thing protecting us is also hurting us.
So I invite you to sit with this question…Why does the thing that distances us from ourselves also feel so comforting? Why is it easier to be who someone needs us to be than to be who we truly are? Maybe the work isn’t about tearing the mask off all at once. Maybe it begins with noticing when we’re wearing one. And gently asking ourselves who we are underneath it.