Rising In The Silence

Because sometimes, the loudest strength is the one that says nothing—and still walks forward.

For a long time, silence was my safe place.

Not the peaceful kind you find in the stillness of morning or the quiet of a library. No—this was the kind of silence that wrapped itself around me like armor. Heavy, suffocating, but necessary. I wore it like a second skin because speaking had never gone well for me.

Growing up, I learned early that my voice was inconvenient. In school, when I raised my hand too much, I was “showing off.” At home, when I asked too many questions, I was told to stop “talking back.” And when I tried to speak up about things that really mattered—the things that hurt—I was met with either disbelief or dismissal.

So I stopped.

I stopped explaining myself.
Stopped correcting people when they misunderstood me.
Stopped speaking truths that made others uncomfortable.

It didn’t happen all at once. It was gradual, like turning down the volume on your favorite song until the room is eerily quiet and you forget what the music even sounded like. Silence became my survival tactic. It was easier to stay quiet than to risk being too much, too emotional, too honest.

But here’s the thing about silence: it’s a liar.

It tells you that if you say nothing, you won’t be judged. That if you shrink yourself, no one will hurt you. That if you keep your feelings locked away, you’ll be safer. But really, it just traps the pain inside you—where it festers in the dark.

I learned that the hard way.

The silence I used to protect myself eventually became the silence that isolated me. I started losing pieces of myself. I’d smile when I was breaking. Numb out when I was supposed to be living. I kept waiting for someone to notice, to reach in and pull me out of the silence I had built around me.

But no one did.

Not because they didn’t care, but because I never let them see.

You can't be rescued from a place no one knows you're in.

So one day—quietly, timidly—I decided to rise.
Not in a grand, cinematic way. There was no music swelling, no inspirational montage. Just a slow, trembling decision that enough was enough.

I started with the smallest act of rebellion: I wrote something honest in my journal.

Just a sentence. Just a feeling.
It was terrifying.

Then I said no to something I didn’t want to do.
Then I spoke up in a meeting at work.
Then I told a friend, “Actually, I’ve been struggling.”

And every time I used my voice, the silence cracked a little more.

It didn’t shatter overnight. There were days I fell back into it—moments when I wanted to disappear again. But something inside me had shifted. I had tasted freedom. I had remembered what it felt like to take up space.

I had realized that my voice mattered.

It didn’t need to be loud. It didn’t need to be perfect. It just needed to be mine.

And here’s the truth that silence had hidden from me for years:
Rising doesn’t require noise.

You can rise in the quiet.
You can rise with tears in your eyes and your voice barely above a whisper.
You can rise in the privacy of your own room when no one’s watching.
You can rise by choosing yourself after years of forgetting you mattered.

There’s a kind of power in quiet strength. In showing up for yourself when no one else knows you’re fighting. In healing, not for applause, but because you’re finally ready to live fully.

Now, when I speak, I do it for the girl I used to be—the one who thought silence was her only protection. I speak for her, to her, through her.

I still have quiet days. I still fear vulnerability. But I no longer mistake silence for safety.

I’m not the loudest in the room. I’m not always brave.
But I rise.
Every day.
Even when it’s hard.
Even when it’s quiet.
Even when no one sees.

Because rising in the silence is still rising.
And that’s enough.