The Fear of Being Seen

What happens when the wins get louder, but so does the fear.

Over the last few months, I’ve watched my world get louder.

More followers. More praise. More wins. More visibility. On paper, this should be the dream. It’s what I worked for. What I sacrificed for. What I envisioned when I started SET at 26, unsure of who I was but certain I was meant to build something meaningful.

And yet, I find myself holding my breath.

Every time I go to share a new milestone, there’s a tightness in my chest. A fear that sneaks in and whispers, What if this is the post that makes people turn on you? What if someone pulls up who you used to be and uses it to cancel out who you are now?

That fear is louder than I expected. It’s lonelier than I expected, too.

I feel like no one talks about this so I will, growth is not just about gaining. It’s also about grieving. You grow out of versions of yourself that you loved, or at least understood. You grieve the days when fewer people were watching. When you could make mistakes without becoming a headline in someone else’s narrative. When you could move through the world without second-guessing every word, every post, every choice.

When I started SET, I was still becoming me. I still am.

The version of me who first built this brand made mistakes ….a lot of them. I’ve been a bad leader at times. I’ve reacted out of fear. I’ve burned myself out and let the people closest to me down. I’ve been so caught up in survival mode that I forgot how to be soft, how to be present, how to say thank you instead of what’s next.

I don’t say that to earn pity or forgiveness. I say it because it’s the truth. And in a world that thrives on perfection, I still believe that truth matters.

There is power in admitting you’ve gotten things wrong. There is strength in growing publicly, even when you wish you could do it privately. I’d be lying if I said there aren’t days where I wish I could make everything private. There is courage in choosing to lead even when you feel like you're barely keeping up with yourself.

But that doesn’t make it easy. Especially not when the internet doesn’t always give people the space to change.

Just last week, my friend Chelsea called me crying. She had become the target of hateful comments on TikTok. A complete pile-on by strangers who didn’t know her at all. She asked me if she could handle it. If she was strong enough to keep showing up when every part of her wanted to disappear.

I told her what I try to tell myself and that I wish I listened to more often than not:

The higher you climb, the more people can see you. And not everyone will like what they see. Not because you’ve done something wrong, but because visibility is a mirror. It reflects people’s admiration, yes, but it also reflects their projections, their pain, their jealousy, their fears.

It’s the cost of growing.

But here's the part I’m still learning to sit with: just because someone tries to reduce you to your past doesn’t mean you have to shrink to fit it. Read that again, because I personally have re read it 10x already.

Growth is uncomfortable. And success, in many ways, makes that discomfort sharper. The stakes feel higher. The pressure builds. You begin to fear that your joy will be punished. That your confidence will be misread as arrogance. That your wins will invite resentment instead of celebration.

But here’s the truth I keep coming back to: I didn’t build this brand by accident. I didn’t survive my own doubt, my own darkness, just to silence myself now. I’ve worked too hard to play small for the comfort of strangers. I’ve sacrificed too much to stop telling my story now that more people are listening.

If you are building something right now whether it’s a brand, a business, a family, a better version of yourself, and you’re scared of being seen, I want you to know that you are not alone.

That fear is real. But it doesn’t mean you're doing it wrong. In fact, it probably means you're doing something really right.

Here’s what growth actually looks like:

• It’s messy.

• It’s humbling.

• It’s full of nights where you question everything and mornings where you get back up anyway.

• It’s failing in public and learning to forgive yourself in private.

• It’s leading before you feel ready.

• It’s posting the win and trusting that the people who matter will understand what it took to earn it.

I’m still learning how to share without apologizing. How to celebrate without disclaimers. How to let myself be proud without fear that pride will invite punishment. I’m still learning how to own my voice, even when it shakes.

And I hope, in sharing this, someone else feels less alone in their own fear. I hope someone else feels seen. Because being seen is scary. But it’s also how we connect. How we lead. How we heal.

So I’ll keep showing up.

I’ll keep being honest.

I’ll keep trusting that growth and fear can coexist. That I can be proud and terrified at the same time. That I can be flawed and still worthy of love, success, and joy.

And so can you.