How to Become a Ghost Without Dying

🕯️ How to Become a Ghost Without Dying

An Illustrated Manual for the Art of Disappearing

A poem by someone who vanished long before they were missed.

Step One: Shrink Your Soul

Fold yourself in half,

then in quarters.

Practice becoming smaller

than your opinions,

quieter than your needs.

Learn how to apologize

for simply existing.

Say “sorry”

when someone bumps into you.

Step Two: Erase the Color

Start with your wardrobe.

Greys. Beiges. Things that blend.

Then your voice.

Smooth out its edges

until it sounds like wallpaper.

Stop laughing.

It draws attention.

And ghosts should never echo.

Step Three: Become a Ghost in Daylight

Walk in crowded streets,

and train yourself

to be unnoticed.

Eye contact is dangerous.

So is smiling.

Be the person

no one remembers

at the end of the meeting.

Step Four: Abandon the Archive

Delete your old poems.

Burn the letters you never sent.

Let your memories dissolve

like ink in rain.

Make your past feel

like someone else’s fiction.

Convince even yourself

that you never existed fully.

Step Five: Learn the Art of Evaporation

Start with rooms.

Then conversations.

Then calendars.

Disappear from birthdays,

dinners,

and Sunday calls.

If they say, “Where’ve you been?”

Smile gently.

Say, “Around.”

Lie like a lullaby.

Step Six: Replace Yourself with Silence

Silence is a cloak.

Wear it until it no longer itches.

Let it replace your laughter,

your anger,

your joy.

They’ll say you’re “so calm now.”

You’ll nod,

but inside,

you’ll ache for thunder.

Step Seven: Forget How to Be Held

Don’t reach for hands.

Don’t fall into arms.

Train your body

to reject comfort

like a foreign language.

When someone hugs you,

stiffen.

Not because you want to—

but because you forgot how not to.

Step Eight: Watch Life Through Frosted Glass

Attend your own life

like a distant spectator.

Watch your friends laugh without you.

Watch love move on.

Watch your name fade

from group chats.

From memory.

From history.

Step Nine: Let the World Misunderstand You

Stop correcting them.

If they call you cold,

wear it like a medal.

If they say you’ve changed,

nod like it was the plan all along.

Let them believe you vanished

because you didn’t care.

It’s easier than explaining

you left to survive.

Step Ten: Become a Master of Absence

Leave rooms before they miss you.

Unfollow people before they notice.

Fade out of photos,

out of traditions,

out of jokes with your name in them.

Be the ghost in the family album—

the smile no one remembers.

Step Eleven: Replace Your Pulse with Paper

Write things you’ll never post.

Journal entries,

ghost drafts,

half-finished confessions.

Write like someone might read them

after you're gone—

but hope they don’t.

Not really.

Step Twelve: Speak Only in Metaphor

Say, “I’m just tired,”

when you mean,

“My soul is unraveling.”

Say, “I need space,”

when you mean,

“I’m disappearing and I don’t know how to stop.”

Language is a shield.

Use it to survive.

Step Thirteen: Choose One Person to Remember You

Just one.

Leave a breadcrumb trail

only they might follow.

A half-written poem,

a whispered goodbye,

a favorite song stuck to a fridge.

They won’t understand the clues—

not at first.

But maybe one day,

when they feel emptier than usual,

they’ll think of you,

and ache like the sky

right before a storm.

Step Fourteen: Accept That Some People Will Let You Vanish

Even the good ones.

Even the ones who promised.

They won’t notice the silence,

the soft absence,

the smile that no longer shows up.

And that,

more than anything,

is what makes you a ghost.

Final Step: Forgive Yourself for Leaving

This wasn’t weakness.

This was survival.

You didn’t disappear to punish the world.

You disappeared

because staying visible

meant bleeding in front of strangers.

Because fading

was softer than breaking.

Because somewhere deep down,

you still hoped

someone would see you fading

and say,

“Come back. I miss you.”