I’ll never forget that “coaching” session.
There I was, sitting across from my boss, expecting feedback on the work I’d poured my heart into. Instead, I got a lesson on how to dim my light. With a patronizing tone, he said, “You don’t want to be known as Quirky Kathy, do you? You’re too cerebral. You need to give people something they can grasp.” He then listed his hobbies as examples of acceptable depth, and subtly suggested I pick the same hobbies: video games, sneaker collecting, and gun shooting.
His words hit like a punch to the gut.
I had stellar performance reviews, yet here he was, picking apart my personality, reinforcing the fear that who I am isn’t acceptable.
In that moment, I wish I had the confidence to stand up for myself. I wish I had said, “Yes, I want to be known as Quirky Authentic Kathy! I have no desire to be a clone of you or anyone else.”
But I didn’t.
Instead, I shrank.
His external success suggested he knew the formula for advancement, and it seemed that formula required me to be less of myself.
So, I amputated parts of my personality from my work self, hiding them behind the empty shell of intellectually-over-compromising-work-Kathy. Ironically, this didn’t help with his complaint that I was too “cerebral.”
Over my lifetime, I learned to become a chameleon. Adept at analyzing what others wanted and serving it up on a silver platter.
I know I’m not alone in this.
Many of us have honed this skill of observation and adaptation. But have you ever stopped to wonder where this impulse originates? For me, this pattern revealed a deep-seated belief that the full, unfiltered, contradictory me wouldn’t be accepted. And, I internalized the feedback that confirmed this fear.
A few years later, a different boss called me an “enigma,” with that same tone of slight disgust. And I realized something important: some people struggle with others who aren’t easy to classify. If they’ve spent a lifetime suppressing parts of themselves, they’re going to have a hard time when they see you expressing those same parts freely.
Here’s the truth: Self-suppression is a form of self-betrayal. When you constantly show up as less than yourself, you start to feel less than. It’s inevitable.
Your “you-ness” is what makes you interesting, unique, and valuable. It’s what sets you apart from the 8 billion other people on the planet. You’re not meant to dilute yourself just to fit into someone else’s box. Their internal classification system? That’s not your problem.
Self-suppression doesn’t just chip away at your self-worth; it disconnects you from your humanity. It silences the voices of your heart, intuition, and creativity, leaving decisions to be made solely by your intellect. The reason for this is that self-suppression requires you to live your brain, gatekeeping what is allowed to be expressed and what isn’t, instead of living in your body and living in the moment.
If you’ve ever felt pressured to be more like someone else to succeed, I hope you know the cost is far too high. The cost is your aliveness. Your you-ness.
But here’s the good news: It’s never too late to reconnect with those parts of yourself.
My coaching program helps you rekindle your spark and get your aliveness back.
Because the truth is, the people who are truly interesting to engage with are never easy to classify.
And life is way more fun when you keep them guessing.
If you want help finding your way back to your full you-ness, book a 1-on-1 coaching call here.
