Why Do We Kill Ourselves to Keep the ‘Peace’?
Learning to hear, see and believe ourselves.
Dear friend,
How are you? And how is your beautiful heart?
I was six years old, with sparkling bright brown eyes and a halo of dark curls floating around my head, when I innocently told a room full of family that an uncle had sexually abused me on a recent family trip to Pakistan. It was at this age that the sparkle in my eyes dulled a little. It was at this age that I quickly learned speaking my truth led to nothing.
The realisation that the same core belief is playing out over and over again 30 years later - that my truth doesn’t really matter - hit me like an ice-cold tidal wave drenching the clothing of my soul in a recent transpersonal coaching session.
Hazy memories slowly became clearer and more vivid the deeper and further back in time I went, as my intuitive and patient coach guided me on the path deep within myself.
I realised that my rebellious nature was born from the refusal of my family to hear me, to validate my experiences and to believe me when I spoke the truth. I realised that as time had gone on, I slowly learned when and where I could speak up and at the same time, when and where I needed to shut up and restrain myself, even if it took all I had to do so. I realised that so many of the relationships throughout my life so far depended on me allowing disrespect to slide, not setting or enforcing any boundaries and keeping quiet, even when there were avalanches of chaos crashing within me, just to keep the peace.
But is there really even any peace when you are the one slowly being poisoned from the inside?
How many of us live our lives like this? Where we find ourselves in situation after situation where the voice within us tells us that something isn’t right and that we must use our external voice and the power that God has granted us to do something about it, but instead we choose to ‘keep the peace’ and say nothing?
The angry co-worker with the passive-aggressive comments. The emotionally-avoidant spouse who reacts aggressively whenever you begin to bring up the slightest concern. The sibling with no evident communication skills who responds in anger whenever you attempt to have a civilised conversation. The friends and family who overlook you and anything positive you may have going on in your life, and belittle you to make themselves feel bigger and better.
And then there are the bigger things. Abuse. Sexual, financial, emotional, psychological. Genocides, apartheid and the rich-poor disparity that more and more of us are waking up to and beginning to see. Mass censorship, hidden agendas and lobby groups leading humanity towards its destruction.
All of it demands recognition.
All of it demands our voices.
All of it demands for us to yield whatever power we have within us, to instigate change.
But unfortunately, for many of us, we either don’t know exactly how to do that, or we are actually unconsciously comfortable within the uncomfortable, or we try our best to do so with the knowledge that we have - but nothing ever changes.
Speaking on Deaf Ears
But what about those, who like me, have spoken up time and time again, against blatant injustice, oppression and inequality? In our personal lives and on a larger scale. What about those, like me, who speak up and are, seemingly, never really heard?
It takes guts to speak up. It takes summoning every ounce of courage from within you and beyond yourself, to know your values deeply and share them openly. Sometimes it takes months and months, if not years and years of build-up, of going back and forth in your own head and heart, just to express your wants and needs - and when it all falls on deaf ears, it can feel like the biggest kick to the gut and the spirit.
What’s the point in mustering every ounce of strength we have to speak our truth when it isn’t received? It’s exhausting, in every way possible.
In the particular coaching session I spoke about earlier, I defeatedly whispered the same words to my coach. “What’s the point if X doesn’t hear me? I’d rather just not say anything - I don’t want to disturb the peace”.
She looked me straight in the eye as she spoke to my heart, and kindly yet with conviction said,
“What if X never hears you? And is there really any peace if you are feeling all of this inside?”
In the days following, these words swirled within me like a key searching for its lock. And then suddenly, everything clicked into place and unlocked a new realisation within.
So what if X didn’t hear me the way I desired to be heard? (And when I say X I refer to every single human to whom I have spoken my truth, only for it to be disregarded completely, manipulated and twisted, or trampled to the ground.)
So again, what if X didn’t hear me? So WHAT?
Did I hear myself? Could I hear myself? See myself? Believe myself? And how much longer could I continue swallowing back my truth to keep up this illusion of ‘peace’, if there was no real peace within me because of it?
Let Them - But Also, Let You
The ‘Let Them’ theory is everywhere within the self-help and spiritual online space at the moment, a concept popularised by Mel Robbins in recent times. On her website she says,
“The Let Them Theory is a step-by-step guide on how to stop letting other people's opinions, drama, and judgment impact your life. Two simple words, Let Them, will set you free from the exhausting cycle of trying to manage everything and everyone around you.”
Sounds simple, right? But when you apply it to situations and spaces where you are not heard, seen or believed, even when you are vocal with your truth, what then? Just ‘let them’? Let them trample all over me? Let them continue disrespecting me? Let them continue abusing me?
To that, I say HELL NO. And thankfully, so does Mel!
In one of her recent podcasts about the Let Them theory, Mel explained that in such situations, it becomes less about ‘letting them’ and more about ‘letting YOU’.
You’ve told them you were abused and they swept it under the rug? You’ve asked them countless times to stop doing something and they continue anyway? You’ve mustered up the courage to tell them you want out but they refuse to hear it?
Okay, let it be. LET THEM. You can’t control them. You can’t control anything outside of yourself. But the only thing and the most important thing that you do have control of, is YOU.
YOU can choose to HEAR, SEE and BELIEVE YOURSELF.
YOU can choose to step away from unharmonious relationships and remove yourself from uncomfortable situations.
YOU can be the one that sets firm boundaries and takes control of your life.
YOU can have the upper hand in what you allow and do not allow into your personal space.
YOU can choose YOURSELF, and choose what is best for YOU.
And I want you to know, deeply, that it is not only okay to choose yourself and what is best for you, but to live a life of true freedom and personal liberation, it is absolutely necessary.
Friend, for so long you were made to believe that speaking up and disturbing the ‘peace’ wasn’t worth it. I hear you. I see you. I believe you. I AM you.
But what I want you to know today is that you can let it go. You no longer need to kill yourself to keep the peace.
And THAT’S what is not worth it. It’s really, really not.
With Light, Love & Peace,
Sabah x
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"Let them but also let you", powerful interpretation of this Sabah, and I have spent most of my life afraid to speak my truth, the light in my eyes dulled at some stage, and now I am trying to understand and make sense of why, and to find the courage to speak up and show up authentically for myself. Thank you so much for having the courage to write and sharing this here on Substack 🙏🌻
Wow, Sabah! With each post, I feel you harnessing your power and unleashing your voice, and damn, do your words hit! I love the “Let Them” theory (hadn’t heard about it before), and the idea of us being the ones to see and hear our own selves. We looked elsewhere for support and validation and got none. But that doesn’t mean we didn’t deserve it. More and more I feel, Sabah, that the world is deaf, the world is blind. It is a minority of people who have the discernment and capacity to really see us and hold space for us. Which makes it all the more important that we hold space for ourselves, too (also, to teach our kids how it’s done). Thank you for being so brave as to share your story and wisdom with us!❤️