It's ok to disappear

Hi friend,

This week’s note is soft, a little shorter and written from inside my own quiet season. I wanted to check in to say hi, but I didn’t want to force anything, so here’s where I’m at.

If there’s one theme I keep seeing - in myself, friends, and strangers online, it’s this:

We’re all tired in a way that rest can’t fix overnight. Depleted is perhaps a better word. 

Navigating seasons of change, uncertainty and discomfort. Working through internal shifts that are hard, confusing and mostly invisible. And yet, we’re also spending precious energy beating ourselves up for not doing enough. 

Bullying yourself about not having the energy to post, text back, organize that dinner, or write the email (*cough*). 

Desperately trying to figure out why everything you used to do effortlessly now feels forced. Panicking that you’ve become a “bad friend,” a flaky leader, a low-effort partner.

You’ve convinced yourself you’re falling behind while everyone else is sprinting.

But let me assure you that isn’t the case.

And perhaps it’s less that you’ve changed, but instead your season has. 

And in this one, the relationship you’re being asked, maybe even forced, to prioritize… It’s the one you have with you.

Something I regularly go back to is Michaela Coel’s 2021 Emmy speech (iykyk), but over these last few months, it’s the mantra I’ve needed on repeat.

It’s ok to disappear. 

It’s ok to disappear.

It’s ok to disappear. 

Her comments were geared toward writers, urging them to write the tale that scares them, the one that demands discomfort and uncertainty. But I believe it also applies to anyone actively writing the story of the life they want to live,

She said:

Because for those of us choosing to constantly grow and evolve, there will always be seasons that require silence.

Seasons of composting, where life is breaking down what’s dead so something else can sprout. Seasons where you can’t show your work yet, because the work is happening internally. Seasons where being visible would actually interrupt the growth.

Seasons that are - Messy. Void-y. Quiet.

And deeply, deeply necessary.

And they’re seasons we don’t speak about enough.

So if that is a season you are also navigating right now, please hear me when I say this:

Do not be afraid to disappear for a while.
Do not let the internet rush you back into visibility.
Do not confuse silence with failure or distance with disconnection.

And, maybe most importantly, don’t forget to offer that same grace to others.

Someone you love might be in their own building season.
Their own grieving season. Their own “I don’t have the words yet” season.

Honour that. Even if it’s silent.

You know the drill: Grab a blanket, a tea, and your journal. Carve out this pocket of stillness like it’s a requirement. Because, for many of us right now, it is.

As always, I have a lesson, 3 questions and a dare for you.

[A LESSON]

There’s this thing our nervous systems do when we’re in transition: they go quiet.

Psychologists call it withdrawal for integration — the instinct to pull inward so your brain can process, reorganize, and rebuild. It’s the same thing animals do after stress or injury: they go somewhere private to heal.

But because we live online, and because visibility has become the modern metric of relevance, we’ve started labelling this instinct as “falling behind.”

Here’s the reframe:

Silence isn’t stagnation - it’s scaffolding.
It’s your system gathering energy for whatever the next version of you is going to require.

And when you try to rush yourself out of your quiet season, when you force the posting, the showing up, the performing, the content treadmill, you end up interrupting your own evolution.

Disappearing isn’t always avoidance.
Sometimes it’s preparation.

Sometimes the most productive thing you can do is vanish from the noise long enough to hear your own thoughts again.

And that, the slowing, the listening, the emptying out, is a crucial part of the work.

[3 QUESTIONS ]

1. Who are you afraid will stop loving you, noticing you, or valuing you if you go silent?

2. If my withdrawal is actually integration, what might be integrating?

3. What small boundaries would support the season I’m in?

[A DARE]

This week,

I dare you to practice disappearing on purpose.

Not in a ghosting way.
Not in a “burn it all down” way.
Just in a slow, gentle, intentional way.

Pick one space where you’ve been forcing visibility, could be - Instagram, group chats, Slack, dating apps, and take a step back. Even for 3 days.

See what comes to you in the silence…

See you on a Sunday,

L