Stop Expecting You From People Who Aren’t You

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I was scrolling TikTok the other day and saw a video that spoke to me, so now I’m going to pass it on to you like some kind of emotionally unstable messenger who refuses to gatekeep things that hit a little too hard.

Because it stuck with me. Not in a loud, dramatic way. In that quiet way where you keep thinking about it hours later, like your brain is trying to gently ruin your life for your own good.

“Don’t break your heart in the pursuit of protecting others.”

And I wish I could say I just nodded, liked the video, and moved on like a normal person. But no. It sat with me. It followed me around. It started connecting dots I wasn’t ready to look at yet.

Because if you’re anything like me, you don’t just care about people. You anticipate them. You adjust for them. You soften yourself in ways you don’t even notice anymore because it’s become second nature.

You think about how something you say might land before you even say it. You rewrite messages in your head. You swallow reactions. You choose your words carefully, not because you’re fake, but because you’re trying to be kind.

And kindness, for you, isn’t surface level. It’s intentional. It’s thoughtful. It’s rooted in not wanting to make anyone feel the way you’ve felt before.

So you protect people.

Even when they didn’t ask for it.

Even when they wouldn’t do the same for you.

And somewhere along the way, that starts to cost you.

Not all at once. Not in some big, obvious moment. It’s small. Subtle. Easy to ignore at first.

It’s the things you don’t say.

The boundaries you don’t set.

The way you let things slide because you don’t want to make it a big deal. The way you convince yourself you’re being “understanding” when you’re actually just… being quiet.

And it adds up.

Because every time you choose their comfort over your honesty, you’re teaching yourself that your feelings are optional.

That your reactions are too much.

That your needs can wait.

And eventually, you don’t even realize you’re doing it anymore.

You just become the person who “gets it.”

The one who doesn’t make things hard.

The one who bends a little more so no one else has to.

And people love that version of you.

Of course they do.

It’s easy to be around someone who never pushes back. Someone who makes everything softer, smoother, more manageable.

But what they don’t see, or maybe what they never had to learn, is what it’s costing you to be that person.

Because the truth is, you’re not just protecting them.

You’re protecting them from you.

From your full reaction. From your disappointment. From your hurt. From the parts of you that deserve to take up space just as much as anyone else’s.

And that’s where it starts to hurt.

Because you’re not asking for a lot.

You’re asking for the same level of care you give so freely.

The same thoughtfulness.

The same awareness.

The same effort to not hurt someone unnecessarily.

But people are not built the same.

And that’s the part that’s hard to accept.

Because you expect you from other people.

You assume they’ll think the way you think. That they’ll consider the things you consider. That they’ll pause before speaking, the way you do.

But they don’t.

Not because they’re bad people. Not always.

They’re just… different.

Cut from a different cloth.

And the cloth you were cut from? It doesn’t come around as often as you think it does.

Which sounds nice, until you realize what it actually means.

It means you’re going to keep overextending yourself for people who don’t even realize what you’re giving.

You’re going to keep holding space for people who have never had to learn how to hold it for you.

You’re going to keep breaking your own heart in quiet, almost invisible ways, trying to make sure no one else ever has to feel uncomfortable.

And at some point, you have to ask yourself…

Who’s protecting you?

Because it can’t always be you sacrificing parts of yourself to keep the peace.

It can’t always be you doing the emotional math, calculating what to say, what not to say, how to say it, when to say it, just to make sure no one else feels a fraction of what you’ve learned to carry.

That’s not balance.

That’s self-abandonment with good intentions.

And I know that’s a hard pill to swallow, because it doesn’t come from a bad place. It comes from love. From empathy. From wanting to be the kind of person you needed at one point in your life.

But you can’t keep being that person for everyone else while slowly disappearing for yourself.

You can’t keep choosing silence every time something hurts just because you’re afraid of what speaking up might change.

Because staying quiet changes things too.

It changes you.

It teaches you that your voice is negotiable. That your feelings are something to manage instead of something to honor.

And over time, that does more damage than any uncomfortable conversation ever could.

You don’t have to become cold. You don’t have to stop caring. You don’t have to start treating people the way they treat you if that’s not who you are.

But you do have to stop expecting people to be you.

You do have to stop giving at a level that’s actively hurting you just because it feels natural.

You do have to recognize that protecting everyone else at the cost of yourself is not kindness.

It’s a pattern.

And patterns can be unlearned.

Slowly. Uncomfortably. Imperfectly.

It starts with small things.

Saying what you actually mean instead of what feels safest.

Letting people sit in a little bit of discomfort instead of absorbing it for them.

Trusting that the right people won’t need you to shrink to stay.

Because the people who are meant for you won’t benefit from your silence.

They’ll benefit from your honesty.

And maybe that’s what that video was trying to say.

Or maybe that’s just what I needed to hear.

Either way, I’m passing it on.

Because if you’ve been quietly breaking your own heart just to keep everyone else comfortable…you don’t have to keep doing that.

You’re allowed to take up space in your own life too.

And that doesn’’t make you selfish.

It makes you whole.

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If protecting others means abandoning yourself, it was never protection. It was just you learning to live without being fully seen.

talk soon, kas

☕💭