What in the southern chile!!

In Southern Chile, I stopped watching myself exist. I didn’t realize how much of my life I had spent monitoring myself until suddenly, I wasn’t. There was nothing in the air asking me to perform. No invisible pressure to present myself correctly. No quiet scanning of who I was supposed to be. I was just there. Walking. Breathing. Existing. And for the first time in a long time, I felt like I was fully inside my own life instead of observing it from a distance.

There was something about the way people lived there that softened me. No one seemed to be trying to prove anything. No one was rushing to become someone else. People moved slowly, naturally, without the constant urgency to optimize or impress. And without even realizing it, my nervous system followed. I wore socks with flip flops because it felt comfortable. Because it was me. And no one looked twice. No one’s eyes lingered. No one silently questioned my existence. I wasn’t being evaluated. I was just another human being in a world full of human beings.

And in that space, I felt internally happy in a way that was quiet and steady. Not the kind of happiness that depends on external validation. Not the kind that needs witnesses. It was deeper than that. It was the kind of happiness that comes when you are no longer abandoning yourself. When you stop adjusting who you are to avoid the possibility of judgment. When your internal world and your external life finally match. I wasn’t performing peace. I was living inside it.

What I didn’t realize was how fragile that feeling could be depending on where you are. The moment I crossed back into the United States, I felt it. The judge returned. Not as a person, but as a presence. I became aware of myself again. Aware of my clothes. Aware of my body. Aware of how I might be perceived. It was subtle, but it was immediate. Nothing had changed about me. But suddenly, I felt like I had to check myself again. Like I was being watched. Like there was a right way and a wrong way to exist.

It wasn’t that anyone said anything. It was the feeling. The familiar tightening in my chest. The quiet instinct to adjust, to blend, to make myself more digestible. And it broke my heart a little, because I realized how quickly environments can make you question your natural state. How quickly you can forget that you were never the problem. The freedom I felt in Chile wasn’t something I earned. It was something that existed when I wasn’t carrying the weight of perception.

That experience taught me something I will never forget. Peace is not created by a place. It is revealed by the absence of pressure. It showed me that the most grounded, authentic version of myself already exists. She isn’t someone I have to become. She is someone I have to protect. She is the version of me that moves from instinct instead of fear. The version of me that trusts herself without needing permission.

Coming back reminded me how easy it is to abandon yourself without even noticing. How quickly you can start shaping yourself around the expectations of others. But now I know what it feels like to live without that weight. I know what it feels like to exist without constantly watching myself. And that awareness changed everything.

The lesson wasn’t that I need to escape to another country to feel free. The lesson was that I am allowed to carry that freedom with me. That I don’t need permission to exist comfortably in my own skin. That authenticity is not something the world gives you. It is something you choose to keep, even when the world makes you aware of yourself again.

Southern Chile didn’t change who I am. It reminded me who I am when I stop abandoning myself. And now that I know what that feels like, I refuse to forget it.