Hot Mess, Big Heart: I’m Done Hiding My Feels

By Mama Tiff

Lately, I’ve been swimming in emotion.
So many changes.
So many layers unraveling in me that I never expected.

And I realized something so simple, but so radical — it stopped me in my tracks.

There are certain emotions I’ve always treated like they were dangerous. Like if I let myself feel them, I’d get hurt. Or if someone else felt them, they would hurt me. Somewhere along the line, I made it my job to avoid certain feelings, to keep myself “safe” — from myself and from others.

I know I’m not alone in that.
I know so many women — maybe you, too — were taught to be pleasing before we were taught to be honest. To read the room. To keep the peace. To be what everyone else needed.

But the truth is this:
I just don’t have the bandwidth to be pleasing anymore.
I only have the bandwidth to be myself.

That shift didn’t happen overnight. It’s been coming for years — three or four, maybe longer. Losing my mom this year cracked something wide open in me. It’s like suddenly there’s space to see who I really am and what I really feel — without twisting myself around anyone else’s comfort.

I come from a family that was more aggressive than soft. Hypervigilance was survival. Reading the room. Calibrating every word and move. Shrinking and expanding myself so I wouldn’t set anyone off.

It’s exhausting.
Bone-deep exhausting.

And I’m not willing to do it anymore.

What I see now is this:
Everyone has a right to their emotions.
I do. You do.

And I’m safe — safer than I’ve ever been — letting myself feel, even when it’s big, messy, or overwhelming. In fact, it’s the only way to actually heal, evolve, and choose who I want to become next.

So if you’re reading this and you’re tired — if you’re wondering whether it’s safe to just be yourself — let this be your permission slip.

You don’t have to wait until you’re seventy or eighty to give up pleasing and start living.

You can begin today.
Right where you are.

With all my love (and all my feelings),
Mama Tiff

THE QUEEN’S PATH