I am an ocean. I am full to the horizon, even when I stay still. And yet, I’ve been told again and again that I am too much: too loud, too intense, too sharp, too deep. The words land like measurements, like someone’s trying to mark my tide levels and set a maximum.

So I pour myself smaller. I dilute. I filter out the salt, dim the currents, skim the surface so it looks calm. Most people don’t even notice what it costs to stay that way. They think the scene I’ve set for them is me.

When you are told you are too much, over time you start to wonder who you’re supposed to be in order to fit. If there is no place you can exist at full capacity, you become fluent in shrinking. You learn every version of yourself that takes up less space, that makes others more comfortable. And in that constant editing, the truest self becomes so rare you almost start to forget its shape.

But the thing about the ocean is this: even when the surface is still, the depth is unchanged. The storm still rolls under the skin of the water. And the more I dilute to meet the scale I’m offered, the more I ache for the moment I can let the whole tide back in.

When someone says they love the ocean, what they usually mean is they love the beach. They enjoy wading in the ocean up to their knees, skimming the surface, taking in the view. They love the idea of the vastness without the reality of being alone in the middle of it.

I find most people like the beach at low tide: soft light, smooth sand, safe to walk without getting wet. They like the ocean pulled back, quiet, predictable. They don’t feel the uncontrollable power of the currents surging just below the surface.

What I don’t let most people see is that for them to walk on the beach, I’m holding back a tsunami. That I keep the tide in check until the shore is empty, until there’s no one left to tell me it’s too much. I’ve learned to hurt myself to make others happy, and I wish people respected that more.