You’re Not Invisible.

You’re Just Done Performing.

I was supposed to take Monday and Tuesday off.

No posting. No comments. No being “on.”

And then I woke up with nothing on my calendar and thought: What the hell do I do with this?

Blank time. No urgent reason to be useful.

And it made me deeply uncomfortable.

Not bored. Not restless.

Uncomfortable.

Because the quiet whispered something I didn’t want to hear:

If you’re not producing, you’re fading.

If you’re not visible, you’re irrelevant.

If you’re not doing something, you don’t matter.

And that’s when I realized: I’ve been conned.

We all have.

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Here’s the con:

You spend your whole life being valued for what you do.

Work. Serve. Caretake. Achieve. Hold it together. Show up. Perform competence.

You keep an invisible scoreboard in your head:

What did you do today? Who did you help? Were you productive? Did you earn your right to exist?

And as long as you’re useful, you’re safe.

But then life shifts.

Retirement. Empty nest. Health changes. Fewer people needing you. Fewer roles demanding you.

And suddenly you’re doing less of what society applauds.

So you start feeling less valuable.

And when you feel less valuable, you pull back.

You stop reaching out. You stop creating. You stop taking up space.

And then you feel invisible.

But here’s the twist:

You’re not invisible because you aged.

You’re invisible because you believed you had to earn the right to be seen.

And when the doing slowed down, you stopped believing you deserved to exist out loud.

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Here’s what this actually looks like:

I know women who can’t say no to babysitting the grandkids—even when they’re exhausted, even when they have plans, even when they don’t want to—because they’re terrified.

Terrified that if they’re not useful, they won’t be wanted.

Terrified that if they stop being the one everyone calls, they’ll become the one everyone forgets.

So they say yes. Again. And again.

Not because they want to.

Because they think their value expires the moment they stop being available.

That’s the loop.

And it’s not just about babysitting.

It’s about every time you override yourself to prove you still matter.

Every time you perform energy you don’t have.

Every time you say yes when you mean no because you’re afraid “no” makes you irrelevant.

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Let me say this plainly:

Invisibility is not something aging does to you.

It’s something you do to yourself when you stop fighting for space.

Not because you’re weak.

Because you’ve been conditioned your entire life to confuse usefulness with worthiness.

You think:

• Being loved = being needed

• Mattering = producing

• Existing = performing

So when the performance slows, you panic.

And you call that panic “getting old.”

Bullshit.

---

I watched a video today of a crane operator moving heavy equipment with surgical precision.

It was mastery. Beautiful. Awe-inspiring.

And I thought: That guy’s going to go to bed tonight feeling proud. He did a thing.

Good for him.

But then I thought:

Why do we need a thing to point to?

Why does a day without output feel like failure?

Why are we so goddamn addicted to proving we deserve to be here?

Because we’ve been trained to believe worthiness needs receipts.

And when you stop producing receipts, you think you stop mattering.

That’s the loop.

And I’m done with it.

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Here’s what I’m doing instead:

I’m spending today doing something that looks like nothing.

Breathing. Listening. Letting my nervous system rest. Noticing what I think. Noticing what I feel.

Not because I’m enlightened.

Because I’m practicing something radical:

Believing I’m allowed to take up space even when I’m not impressing anyone.

Even when I’m not producing.

Even when I’m not performing.

Even when I have nothing to show for the day except that I existed in it.

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So here’s my question for you:

When you imagine a day with no output—what’s the fear sentence that shows up?

“I’ll be forgotten.”

“I won’t matter.”

“I’m wasting time.”

“I’m lazy.”

“I don’t know who I am without something to do.”

Name it in the comments.

Because naming it is how you cut the loop.

And cutting the loop is how you stop disappearing.

If this hit you—if you saw yourself in the babysitting example, if you recognized the invisible scoreboard, if you’ve ever felt like you’re disappearing—you’re not alone.

And you don’t have to keep living in that loop.

I write about this every day in The Daily RE-WIRE. Not just naming the problem—but showing you how to cut the loop. How to reclaim your worth. How to exist out loud again without needing permission or proof.

Right now, I’m offering 20% off annual subscriptions.

When you subscribe, you’ll get immediate access to my BREAKTHROUGH workbook—the guide I created to help you stop performing and start living like someone who knows she matters.

Here’s what you get:

• Daily essays like this one—honest, unfiltered, lived

• The BREAKTHROUGH workbook (yours immediately)

• Full access to the archive

• Weekly live workshops every Tuesday at 7 PM EST

• A community of women who are done shrinking

This isn’t about adding more to your plate.

It’s about finally setting the plate down.

It’s about learning to take up space without apologizing for it.

It’s about remembering you were never supposed to earn your right to exist.

The loop keeps running as long as you let it.

Cut it.

We’re here when you’re ready.

—Monic

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