I think when you’re evolving from being a people pleaser into someone with more boundaries it can feel so strange, because it’s hard to tell if you’re being mean or if you’re just listening to your own feelings for once, because you’re so used to only thinking about others first.
I try to find you, yet you are not here. / I’ve studied absence, fought to fill it in—
— Denise Riley, from "Hiding in plain sight," Say Something Back & Time Lived, Without Its Flow






