“You’re so cool.” “I love your energy.” “There’s something about you.” “You’re not like everyone else.”

Which is funny, because I mostly feel like someone trying very hard to look normal without making it obvious that I’m trying.

After a job interview, I got: “I really like your energy.”

My energy?

I was sitting there trying to remember if I had nodded too much or not enough. Mentally adjusting my posture in real time like it was a live performance.

But apparently, I give off something. As someone who professionally overthinks every micro-expression, that’s confusing information. Because in my head, I’m an anti-vibe.

I’m someone who cries at TikToks with dogs and babies, Googles movie endings like patience is a limited resource, and buys books based on the last page because I don’t fully trust myself with suspense. I sing in public like I’m auditioning for a musical no one agreed to attend. I don’t like black coffee, I’ll only drink alcohol if socially cornered, and I genuinely prefer a morning run over a night out.

My Instagram is an aesthetic misunderstanding at best. Every few weeks I declare I’m going to delete it, and yet my screen time tells otherwise.

So when people say things like that, I never quite know what to do with it. I feel like someone trying not to create too much noise in her own existence. But apparently that still reads as something.

Maybe that’s the strange part: That other people can experience you as coherent while you feel like a collection of loosely connected thoughts trying to behave.

Or maybe nobody is as defined as they think they are, and we just fill in each other’s gaps with words like energy and vibe, because “I don’t know, but you felt good to be around” is too vulnerable to say out loud.

And maybe that’s my vibe; not cool, not mysterious. Just… human enough to be slightly unexplainable in one sentence.

If I’m honest, I’ve recycled men more than once. I don’t think that’s always wrong, but in my case it starts to feel like a pattern I keep walking into with my eyes open. The strange part is this: every time someone from my past comes back, I genuinely believe it could work this time. That something has changed.

And every single time, I’m wrong.

Over the past years, I’ve done what you’re “supposed” to do; I went to therapy. I read the books. I learned about attachment styles, patterns, nervous systems, boundaries. I can analyze a room full of people and in five minutes I tell you who is avoidant, who is anxious, and who is replaying their childhood in real time. On paper, I did everything right.

I became very good at stepping into situations and choosing the “correct” response. I would think before I spoke. Rewrite messages. Edit my feelings until they sounded reasonable enough to send. And when I finally hit send, I would feel it: that short moment of pride. Like I had been strong. Mature. In control.

But it never lasted. A few minutes later, I would feel completely drained. Disconnected from myself. Like I had performed emotional intelligence instead of actually living it.

Don’t get me wrong - I believe in therapy. I think everyone walking on this ticking timebomb would benefit from a therapy session from time to time. But somewhere along the way, I started overdoing it. Overanalyzing everything. Dissecting every reaction. Turning my own mind into something I constantly observe instead of inhabit and I’m tired of it. Tired of walking on eggshells in anticipation of the next thing that might hurt me. Tired of opening my notes app to draft the perfect response to pain. Tired of being in connections where I feel like I have to prepare arguments instead of experiencing connection.

I also started to notice something uncomfortable about myself:

I don’t just fall in love. I select love.

It feels like, at the beginning, I already know how the story will end. The signs are often there. Clear, even. But there is always a part of me that ignores them - a small, stubborn piece of hope that insists this time will be different.

It never is.

Underneath all of this is something simpler, and harder to admit. At some point, I started believing I wasn’t enough. Not smart enough. Not pretty enough. Not thin enough. Not lovable enough. And even though I’ve done a lot of work to unlearn that, it still shows up - especially when connections go wrong. That’s when that little voice starts screaming ‘Didn’t I tell you so?’ Result: I’m hurt and disappointed. So I shut down, after sending that over-analyzed text.

I think I’m at a point now where I can’t ignore the pattern anymore. It’s not about finding better arguments, or better boundaries, or better explanations. It’s about learning to notice earlier and to act upon it. To trust what I already see, instead of hoping it will turn into something else.

And yes - it sucks.

It’s uncomfortable. It goes against what feels familiar. Against old habits, old versions of safety, old ways of loving. But I also know this much:

In the long run, I don’t want to keep repeating the same story. I just want to love and to be loved.

So for now, I’m just learning to see it more clearly.

Even if it hurts a bit to look.