2.1 - The Mask We Had to Build

Why identity often forms around protection—not authenticity

We don’t start life with a fixed identity.

We start with a need:

• to understand who we are
• to feel loved as that person
• and to stay emotionally safe in the world we landed in.

But for many of us, that world didn’t reflect back who we really were.

It asked us to shrink, adapt, or perform.

So instead of growing from the inside out,

we learned to survive from the outside in.

This is where the mask begins.

Not because we’re fake.

But because we needed to feel safe.

So we started asking…

• What version of me gets love?
• What version gets approval, attention, or safety?
• What part of me is “too much”—and needs to disappear?

The False Self Isn’t a Lie.

It’s a strategy.

And it usually works.

We become the good student.

The helpful daughter.

The funny one.

The “strong” one.

But over time, this mask becomes who we think we are.

We lose track of the real self beneath.

And sometimes… we even feel ashamed that it’s still there.

Why This Matters

If you’ve spent your life being who others needed you to be—

It doesn’t mean you’re lost.

It means your identity was shaped by emotional survival.

And that means:

You don’t need to “find yourself” from scratch.

You need to remove the mask that protected you—and meet who’s underneath.

This framework will help you do that.

Together, we’ll explore:

• how emotional pain shapes identity
• how we split between our real and survival self
• and how to begin coming home to who you actually are

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