The Struggle to Share

Dear Tina,

Sharing has never been hard for me.

If you ask my mother, she will tell you I grew up shy. In most spaces, I stayed to myself, and was very particular about the people I opened up to. But It wasn’t so much that I was shy, I was afraid. I was different. And my voice, my personality, and my peers reminded me of it.

Staying quiet was not my instinct, it was my protection.

Lucky for me, born in the year of ‘97, by the time I could no longer avoid socialization, the internet begin to boom into social media with things like Myspace, Bebo, Tumble, and Twitter.

Finally, a place I could share and find people who were attracted to my differences.

It was cathartic at first. I yelled and screamed things just to see if the safety was a hoax. Trauma and pain I had no where else to put. And once I blew off that steam, I simply started sharing all the things the real world didn’t have space for.

That’s when it became addictive.

Then it was rewarding.

And eventually, it was suffocating.

Me.

Sharing went from keeping me from connecting with others to the means of paying my bills, my ego, my purpose, my identity, and my regard within society, and most importantly my family.

I found myself struggling to connect with the real world. I had become so accustomed to sharing everything that living life felt empty if no one witnessed it.

Sharing had officially become hard for me.

Because I resented it.

I met you on the mountain around this time. I was not only struggling with sharing. But with what exactly I wanted to share. How I wanted to share it. Who I wanted to share it with. And If I wanted to share at all.

But the second you spoke, and smiled at me, It felt like you had already heard everything I had to say. From my childhood, to the morning of. Like I had been sharing with you all my life and the smile on your face was a result of it.

I felt it. But you knew it.

You asked if we could record a video of our conversation with no knowledge that the camera scared me at the time. And I reluctantly said yes because I felt safe.

And I keep saying yes, because I feel safe.

Tina, If it wasn’t for you. I would not be who I am today. Your existence keeps showing me more parts of myself that I pray to God to reveal.

For two years, I have been offline and not sharing, for many reasons. Some I still believe, most of which may be excuses.

However I judge them, what I do know, for sure, is it is the safety you offer that has put me in the place to share again.

To be excited to share again. To be confident to share again. To be impatient to share again.

And for that Tina, I cannot thank you enough.

I believe in Bridging the Gap and our relationship more than I understand it.

And it is that exact mirroring of Faith that lets me know, this is is exactly where and what I need to be doing.

And I’m so grateful to being doing it-life, sharing, the show -with you .

love,

Tarek