Being Seen vs Being Known

confessions from someone who’s always been better at performing than existing

From a very young age, I knew I wanted to be seen. I was the most confident, sassy little girl you could ever meet. I’d jump at any chance to sing in front of people, usually my parents. Putting on concerts in our living room was basically a nightly ritual (costume changes and choreography were heavily involved). I’d sing for waiters at restaurants, teachers at school, anyone who would listen really. And if my parents took me somewhere with a stage and a microphone, forget it. It was only a matter of time beforeI finessed my way onstage and performed like I was headlining a sold-out arena when really it was a hole in the wall Mexican restaurant that for some reason was okay with letting a seven-year-old sing Katy Perry’s “I Kissed a Girl” while people half-listened over chips and guac. Lol.

So it never surprised my parents that I grew up to become a performer. With a choreographer mom and a songwriter dad, I think having a “Hollywood kid” was secretly the dream.

Looking back, my childhood was pretty unconventional. By fourth grade, I’d built a YouTube audience of over 100,000 subscribers, who I was feeding with weekly videos of Disney Channel skits and song covers, mind you, I could barely multiply at the time.

As exciting as it was to feel like a celebrity at school, having a public presence online also meant exposure to endless criticism. Comments about the gap in my teeth like, “the horses called they want their teeth back” bruised my little heart for sure, but instead of breaking me, it forced me to develop impenetrable thick skin. Eventually, I became desensitized.

People assume I’m naturally open because I share so much online. But what they don’t see are the endless re edits, retouches and over analyzing that goes into a single post where I have to ask myself, “does this encapsulate who I am as an artist and a brand and is it cool but still reflects who I want to be as a role model to young people?” like girl, is it really that serious it’s just a photo dump.

Growing up on social media made me the director of my own life, carefully curating every frame, performance, and angle. Being so well rehearsed on camera ends up kinda being my natural mode off camera as well. I never want to say or do the wrong thing and that leaves very little room to simply exist in the world as a real, unedited person.

And it’s affected my relationships for sure. The idea of letting someone get close enough to perceive me in ways I can’t control makes me deeply uneasy. Just a few weeks ago, I was on a date, struggling to stay present in the conversation because I was fixated on the fact that he was sitting to my left, looking at the left side of my face, what I’ve convinced myself is most definitely my “bad side.” It sounds so stupid when I say it out loud, but it’s real.

I find myself pretty embarrassing, especially when I think about the fact that most mornings I end up spending at least a half hour in bed scrolling through videos of myself that my Tik Tok algorithm is unfortunately very well trained in showing me which leads to doom scrolling the comments for another thirty minutes, like god if I’m gonna spend that much time on social media I could at least do myself the favor of reading an article or two about like the news or politics. But my whole identity has been based on being this confident performer, that in almost all other areas of life I feel like i’ve fallen short. I dropped out of high school and pretty much academically peaked at 7th grade, parking still feels like rocket science, and dating is close to impossible. I think thats why I’m obsessed with performing because it’s the only time I feel good at something.

as much as I want to keep up the performance act of “I have it all together” the reality is that couldn’t be further from the truth. At some point the cameras have to cut and I have to face the fact that i’m a very real, messy, imperfect person who doesn’t have it all figured out. but maybe thats what makes me interesting. Maybe that’s what makes me worth knowing.