You have heard that it is okay not to be okay. You told one person something true and then made a joke before they could answer. You cried in front of someone once and apologized for a week. You promised yourself you would open up, and when the moment came you said you were fine. I fell apart in front of people once and was so embarrassed I've stopped going where they'd see me.
The Strong rule tends to loosen when you let someone see that you are not okay, and they move toward you and not away. A decision to be more open can't produce that by itself, and being told that people would understand can't either.
01
Why what you tried didn't hold
Telling someone and then taking it right back leaves nothing for them to respond to. The joke, the anyway, the quick change of subject each close the moment before anything can happen in it.
Kind words may fall short for a similar reason. You can always talk to me is an offer. What may be missing is not an offer but the experience itself: being seen in a hard moment, and finding out what the other person does.
02
What the rule is waiting for
What you tried dealt with the habit. This is what may be under the habit.
What it says will happen
If they see me struggle, they'll see I was never who they thought. "Strong is the only version of me they know."
Under the Strong rule is a fear, that if they see you struggle, you lose the only standing you have. One reason it may have lasted is that the fear rarely gets checked against what people really do. When the composure arrives first, the people around you never have to respond to you struggling, so you never see how they would.
The experience that answers it is a particular one: admitting you are not okay, and watching someone come closer. That is being seen at less than full capacity and still being held.
03
Three things to do
The steps below are meant for someone who has been kind to you. Anyone who has used a low moment against you is the wrong person to start with.
- Catch the fine. Each evening, ask when you said you were fine that day. Leave it at that for the first week. The point is to see how automatic it is.
- Tell one person, in the present tense. A few plain words will do, such as I'm not doing well today. Not the whole story, and not once it is over.
- Stay for the answer. Don't joke, don't apologize, don't ask about them. Give it a full minute. Then look at what they did.
04
What to expect
The composure will probably get there before you do. You may hear I'm fine come out and have to go back and correct it. Going back counts.
Once it is said, you may hurry to make it smaller, adding that it is not a big deal or that other people have it worse. Catching yourself at that is useful, whether or not you stop.
Some people will come closer. I was honestly shocked when someone finally saw through me. Some may not know what to do, because they have only ever known you as the steady one. Their not knowing what to do may say more about habit than about how they feel toward you, and it can shift once they have seen you this way more than once.
And the old way will probably come back, especially on bad days. The time someone came closer still happened.
05
When this is the wrong page
Suppose you let someone see, they move toward you, and nothing eases. Then Strong may not be the rule involved, or may not be the only one.
Two questions can help sort that out. If someone helped you and literally nobody would ever know, would you accept? Still no is the Burden answer. The hard part may then be owing, and the Burden rule has more on that. And which would be harder: them not needing you, or them seeing you struggle? Not needing you is the Needed answer, and Needed is the page for it. What the Strong Rule Gets Mistaken For goes through the others.
Two limits matter. In some places, and with some people, showing strain really is used against you, and your caution there is accurate. If that person is your partner, none of this page applies.The National Domestic Violence Hotline is 1-800-799-7233. If tonight is an emergency, call or text 988 (US). This library is not that door. And if what you have been hiding is how bad things have become, licensed mental-health care is the right door.
The thinking behind these steps is on What is subtraction?