There’s a story people like to tell about growth.
It usually goes something like this: you learn something, you refine it, you get better at explaining it, and eventually you become useful to others.
That story never quite fit.
What actually unfolded was quieter, less linear, and far more uncomfortable. Not because the insight itself was unstable—but because my relationship to communicating it kept collapsing under the weight of other people’s expectations.
Looking back now, across early writing, coaching, conversation, podcasting, and eventually stepping back into something far more impersonal, one thing stands out clearly:
The insight didn’t change.
My relationship to “helping” did.
The Earliest Insight Was Never About Helping
When the first insights landed, there was no sense of mission. No desire to guide, improve, or save anyone. There wasn’t even a sense of having something.
There was simply a recognition:
that identity was assumed,
that thought was mistaken for self,
and that most human suffering was sustained by trying to protect something that wasn’t actually there.
That recognition didn’t arrive with compassion as a value.
It arrived with clarity.
Compassion, empathy, patience—those came later, and only as side effects. Not because I cultivated them, but because the walls that required their opposites gradually fell away.
At the time, I didn’t understand that distinction. I assumed that if something was seen clearly, it would naturally be useful. That if something was true, it would help.
That assumption turned out to be one of the most persistent illusions to unravel.
When Insight Meets Projection
The first time you speak from clarity, it’s easy to believe you’re just sharing. You don’t yet see the structure you’re stepping into.
People don’t hear from a neutral place. They hear from within their own unresolved tension. And when someone speaks without defending an identity, without needing approval, without signaling status or alignment, something strange happens.
They fill the space.
Over time, I watched the same pattern repeat:
- Some people turned me into a guru
- Some turned me into a threat
- Some into a romantic projection
- Some into a parent
- Some into a villain
- Some into a savior
- Some into a fraud
Often, the same person cycled through several of these roles.
None of them had much to do with me.
This wasn’t something I understood intellectually at first. It was something life demonstrated repeatedly, until it became impossible to ignore.
Coaching and the Illusion of Guidance
Life coaching emerged not as a plan, but as a response to demand. People wanted clarity, and the culture already had a container for “someone who helps.”
At first, it seemed reasonable. Conversations were deep. Insights landed. Shifts happened.
But slowly, something became apparent:
People weren’t actually exploring their existence.
They were outsourcing it.
They wanted reassurance.
They wanted orientation.
They wanted someone else to hold the uncertainty.
Even when progress appeared to happen, it was fragile. Dependent. Often followed by collapse, resentment, or subtle blame when clarity didn’t translate into permanent relief.
Eventually, it became undeniable:
You can’t guide someone to something they aren’t willing to stand in alone.
No amount of empathy bridges that gap.
No amount of skill resolves it.
And worse—the act of “helping” quietly reinforced the very structure that obscured clarity in the first place.
So coaching ended. Not in frustration, but in recognition.
Distance Didn’t Solve Projection—It Changed Its Shape
The podcast came next, partly as a way to remove myself from the one-on-one dynamic. No direct responsibility. No personal reliance. Just conversation, inquiry, and shared exploration.
It helped—temporarily.
But projection doesn’t require proximity. It only requires identification.
Listeners still attached.
Still formed narratives.
Still imagined relationships that didn’t exist.
Some felt deeply understood and confused that with intimacy.
Some felt exposed and reacted defensively.
Some built identities around agreement or opposition.
And when the image they constructed inevitably cracked, the fallout followed the same familiar arc.
This wasn’t a failure of boundaries.
It was a lesson about how identification works, regardless of medium.
What Never Changed
Throughout all of this—writing, coaching, speaking, withdrawing—one thing remained unchanged:
Clarity does not belong to anyone.
And it cannot be given.
No method made it more accessible.
No tone made it safer.
No framing prevented misuse.
The only thing that ever shifted was where I stood in relation to it.
When I tried to help, I became something to lean on.
When I tried to teach, I became something to follow.
When I tried to explain, I became something to misunderstand.
And when I simply stood in what was clear, without agenda, people still reacted—but the reactions were no longer confusing.
They were simply what happens when certainty dissolves in the presence of openness.
This same tension shows up in how people approach understanding itself, something we explore more broadly in why clarity often feels harder the more we understand.
Empathy Isn’t a Practice—It’s a Side Effect
One of the subtler shifts over time was the realization that empathy isn’t something to cultivate.
It arises naturally when there’s no need to defend.
When conceptual walls fall—when the need to be right, safe, special, or understood relaxes—what remains is responsiveness. Not sympathy. Not performance. Just openness.
And openness doesn’t guarantee harmony.
It invites projection.
People will still try to make you into something. That doesn’t stop. What changes is that you stop confusing their reactions with responsibility.
Writing Without Needing to Be Heard
Proof That You’re God emerged from this recognition.
Not as a culmination, but as a stripping away.
There’s no attempt in that book to guide, persuade, or improve the reader. It doesn’t ask for trust. It doesn’t offer safety. It doesn’t promise outcome.
It simply removes assumptions.
The same is true of the ongoing effort to build this library of resources—not a path, not a program, not a progression. Just material for those who already feel the tension and are willing to look without being led.
That distinction matters.
People who want to be helped won’t find what they’re looking for there.
People who want to explore will.
And that difference can’t be managed. It can only be respected.
The Ongoing Lesson
The lesson wasn’t “don’t share.”
And it wasn’t “share better.”
It was this:
Be what you are.
Let communication be what it is.
And allow people to meet themselves in the space between.
Some will walk away.
Some will attach.
Some will project.
Some will resist.
None of that requires correction.
Life unfolds as it does. People happen as they happen. And clarity doesn’t need a role in that process to remain intact.
Where This Leaves Things Now
I no longer think in terms of helping.
Or teaching.
Or leading.
There is being.
There is conversation.
There are resources.
And if someone feels drawn to explore, they will.
Not because they were guided, but because something in them was already moving.
That’s the same thing that was true at the beginning.
It never changed.
Closing
If you’re interested in the work that reflects this phase most clearly, Proof That You’re God stands as a record of what remained once the need to help dissolved.
And the growing library of resources exists not as an offering, but as an open field—available to anyone with the will to look for themselves.
