How to Keep Your Softness Without Losing Your Standards

There was a version of me that didn’t know how to do both.

Soft or safe. Kind or clear. Open or protected.

But life taught me this: when you grow up learning to accommodate everyone, softness becomes dangerous. Because your softness is weaponized. Because your kindness gets used. Because your empathy becomes an open door for anyone who knows how to walk through it.

So we shut it all down. We become hard. Sharp. Distant. It feels like power. But it’s just a shield. It keeps out the bad, and everything else.