Monsters You Don’t See I was able to take a chance on myself invest in myself because I trusted myself to do what needed to be done to take care of myself. Or at least, that’s what I told myself. Of course I’ll take a short-term risk and invest everything I have into an idea my time, energy, sanity if I think it’ll be worth it. I’ve always believed I could trust myself to take care of myself. Or did I? If I’m honest, the only promise I’ve ever truly kept to myself is this: I will ensure an interesting experience. As a case manager at the employment office, I used to see it all the time once one thing slips, everything slips, especially if that thing is your job. But when my job slipped (if you can even call it that it was more like getting my hopes up sky-high before watching them crushed to dust), I didn’t feel it all at once. At first, I was just shocked. Baffled. I felt stupid and crazy, like I’d missed something everyone else could see. Still, I had savings, a little cushion, and enough faith in my skills, work ethic, and education to assume I’d bounce back quickly. That was two years ago. Since then, I’ve had interviews where I stumbled, and others where I killed it. One recruiter even told me I “crushed it.” The hiring team had been thrilled by my pre-interview work apparently, no one else had gone “above and beyond” the way I had. Surely, this would go well. It didn’t. Same story, over and over promising start, strong interview, radio silence. By the third time, I started to wonder if I was cursed. Like there was something on me that I couldn’t scrub off, something invisible repelling opportunity. I asked for feedback. Nothing. Ghosted, again and again. So, in a way, I’ve succeeded. I did give myself the “interesting experience” I promised. I took a chance on me, let myself relax, believed I could do whatever I wanted. Why shouldn’t I? I’d worked hard, earned the credentials, avoided disaster wasn’t this supposed to be the reward? But what followed wasn’t rest. It was annihilation. Emotional annihilation. I was wrecked but I didn’t want to get up. So I didn’t. I lay down. And for a while, I enjoyed the hell out of it. That’s when I met the monsters. Not the ones under the bed, but the kind that live in possibility the versions of yourself you’d rather not consider, but that still remain entirely possible. Monsters are just possibilities living on the edge of your perception, waiting for the right moment to slip in. If you happen to see one really see one, smell its breath, feel its presence it’s probably just lost. That’s why they look so ferocious. They’re scared. More scared of you than you are of them. It’s the monsters you don’t see that should worry you. They’re not afraid at all. They know you can’t see them. And maybe that’s what this is the invisible monster of a life that doesn’t align neatly with the world. The kind that refuses to be easily categorized, easily hired, easily explained. Maybe that’s the price of choosing to live an interesting experience. 2025 Lyrics by Nikki H. / GenXDreams
