Feelings Don’t Fit in a Closet
The closet was never just a place. It was an emotional storage unit. And I am done paying rent.
RANT: The Myth of the One-and-Done Coming Out
Coming out is not a one-time event. It’s not a clean break, a single conversation, a big reveal followed by applause and rainbows.
It’s messier than that. Layered. Exhausting. Emotional.
Most of us were sold the narrative that we “come out,” and then what? We’re magically living our truth? Accepted by everyone, finally free?
That’s a big nope. We come out again and again (and again and again and ag…).
We come out to the new coworker who assumes. To the doctor who misgenders. To the family member who still won’t say our partner’s name. To ourselves. (Especially when we realize this part of us still hasn’t been given space to breathe.)
Coming out isn’t one brave moment.
It’s a lifetime of decisions about what to reveal, what to protect, and how much of yourself you can afford to lose or reclaim in the process. And each of those decisions? They come with feelings.
Grief. Rage. Shame. Hope. Longing. Relief. Joy.
But nobody teaches us how to hold those. Especially not how to reconcile feeling so many of them at the same time. The world just expects us to wrap them in glitter and pride flags and perform like we’re fine.
We’re not always fine.
We. Are. Not. Always. Fine.
And that’s not failure. That’s just truth.
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REFRAME: Coming Out as Emotional Curriculum
Here’s the shift I’m going for:
Coming out isn’t a moment. It’s a life-long curriculum.
You weren’t given a syllabus. No one told you there’d be pop quizzes on trauma and extra credit for pretending you’re okay. But here you are, showing up anyway.
Coming out is emotional work. It’s EQ work.
It asks:
• Can you name what you’re feeling? (Know Yourself)
• Can you sit with the mess? (Choose Yourself)
• Can you recognize the fear and still move toward authenticity? (Give Yourself)
Every closet is built from emotional debris. The wood might be shame or fear, the nails might be guilt, the hinges might creak with self-doubt. And still, we push through. We dismantle. We choose to feel.
And that’s the thing no one celebrates enough. The emotional intelligence it takes to live queerly in a world that’s built to erase you.
This emotional intelligence work isn’t a nice to have. It’s survival. It’s how we learn to breathe again after years of holding our breath in spaces that demanded we shrink.
It’s how we say: Actually, I don’t want to live in that closet anymore. Emotionally, spiritually, politically, or otherwise.
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RADIATE: Liberation Is Emotional Literacy
So what do we do with all this?
Big shocker here. Ready? We feel.
We stop shoving the grief back in the box. We let joy exist with sadness, not in spite of it. We tell the truth, first to ourselves, then, maybe, to the world.
Emotional intelligence gives us language.
It helps us understand that our anger is holy. That our grief is not weakness. That our hope is not naive. And that our love — queer love, self-love, community love — is powerful enough to disrupt systems.
This is what Pride means to me now. Not a performance. Not a brand. Not a rainbow-washed corporate campaign.
But a deeply personal reclamation of every feeling I wasn’t allowed to feel. And an invitation, for those who are ready, to do the same.
So if you’re holding something heavy this month, I see you.
If there’s a truth in you still waiting for daylight, I believe in you.
And if you want to talk EQ, queerness, grief, rage, joy, or just sit in the complexity, I’m here.
Let’s stop paying rent on closets we don’t belong in. Let’s feel our way to freedom.