The Loneliness That Success Cannot Fill
- Ceri Lan
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
For the woman who is strong, capable and quietly aching to be seen.
1. Being Independent To Self Protection
There was a time I thought I had everything figured out.
I had built a comfortable life on my own: independent, stable, capable.
I told myself, “I’m finally fine.”
But as the world reopened after COVID, something unsettling before, became undeniably clearer. Whenever I went out and socialized, especially with those I didn’t know well, I would come home drained.
A subtle resistance would rise in me.
A part that wanted to stay home.
Stay unseen.
Invisibility feels safe.
It took me a while to realize: I wasn’t just introverted.
I was afraid of entering spaces where people might look at me, yet never truly see me.
A quiet ache rose each time I was overlooked, leaving me with that familiar sting of insignificance.
Hiding behind a polished successful social self, would guarantee I am impressive enough to be noticed, accepted or liked. It is safer to hide behind this protection.
Yet, by the time I got home, I was often exhausted.
In the privacy of my sanctuary, when all those protections can drop, I finally began to pay attention to the voice of my fears within.
2. Being Loved, and Still Unseen.
I grew up in Vietnam in the 80s, the first Vietnamese generation to experience freedom after the American war.
My grandparents endured colonization.
My parents rebuilt from war and poverty.
People of past generations did not have the luxury of emotional nurturing.
Their love was about survival: food on the table, shelter, education.
Their presence was roles, responsibilities, and long hours of working away.
From one angle, those sweats, stresses and sacrifices were their form of showing love.
From another, survival-mode love often left the child inside me, and most others feeling:
Unseen.
Silenced.
Insignificant.
Meals were shared, but presence was missing.
Connection was replaced by performance.
Worth measuring by success.
So I learned early on, to be like them,
Become strong, capable, and unbothered.
I stop needing…
Because needs, when unmet, felt painfully disappointing.
This is where the need to be seen, quietly fractured.
3. The Hidden Cost of Becoming “The Strong One”
Independence born from emotional lack and pain, isn’t peace.
It’s protection.
And protection, if never removed, becomes isolation.
Inside me and so many women I have carefully observed,
there is a part that wants to be seen, to heard, to be held
regardless of performance or perfection.
But this need was never met.
Yet many women continued a familiar pattern: We tried to be seen through the performance. We showed up as the achiever, the reliable one, the dutiful daughter, the capable wife, the perfect mother, the competent woman, in the exchange of being seen.
It works,
until it doesn’t.
Without those shining armors, your inner light feels too vulnerable.
So you hid it again.
And again.
Until burnout arrives like a quiet collapse.
This is the modern survival cycle: A woman who appears successful, admired, and capable yet inside, she feels alone.
4. Why Being Seen Truly Matters?
Here’s a very important truth most of us were never taught:
To be seen is to know you matter. Not for what you do, but because you exist.
But before you can be seen, you must first feel safe to be yourself.
And many people don’t.
The real work begins when:
Begin to welcome and embrace your inner voice,
allowing those yearnings and fears to be seen,
Slowly in small ways, safely by the right people who you can trust.
The first person, perhaps can start with you,
through journaling, or some form of reflective practices.
Maybe, you can meet up with a dear friend who truly listens.
And very powerfully, if you can start with a therapist
someone who can stay with your vulnerability
without flinching, fixing, or demanding.
Because when you are seen
gently, safely, consistently
something in you begins to reorganize.
You develop self-awareness.
You access self-understanding.
You begin to self-heal.
This is not self-improvement.
This is self-returning.
And it changes everything,
especially intimacy with yourself and your loved ones.
The highest form of love is not perfection.
It is being seen in your fullness.
All of them:
the nice parts,
the scary parts,
the parts you’ve never shown
and knowing that you are loved all the same.
That is the kind of love
that reaches the hidden chambers,
mends what grief once claimed,
and lingers like a soft eternity.
To continue deepening on this topic, next in this series, I will share with you:
Steps to gently unhide, to loosen the protector, and let your essence breathe again.
Where does true belonging live?
How do we return to ourselves, slowly and safely?
To follow this series, subscribe to The Presence Flower Newsletter.
From my heart,
