Give The People What They Want

The bottle read, “Drink me.” She drank.

She felt very strange - like she was shrinking, and in fact, she was.

She had shrunk to the perfect size.

But she had not fallen down a rabbit hole; she was not in Wonderland. There was no Mad Hatter, no White Rabbit. She was still in her house. There he sat, and so did she. There they were, living out the story they had been told.

No one had mentioned this unwritten twist that she unknowingly went along with - in order for him to play his role, she would need to shrink.

Just enough to appear like she was a little less, yet still a respectable size.

So she raised her cup without another thought -

And she drank.

 

 

It was the summer before my third birthday, and I was sitting in a pew next to my grandmother in church. I decided I wanted to leave. So, I tugged on her sleeve and said, “I want to go.”

She immediately shushed me.

“I want to go now,” I whispered - in a whisper that was not a whisper.

“Hush,” she whispered back - also not a whisper.

People were starting to look. My grandmother, in her church dress and pearls.
Me, in my pink embroidered cotton dress and patent leather Mary Janes. A not-so-quiet battle of wills, in front of God and everyone else.

She pulled me onto her lap. I began to squirm, then used my full dead body weight to slide down to the floor by her feet and announced – loudly - “I want to go!”

That did it.

She grabbed me under my arms and carried me out into the hot Georgia summer. I felt the sweet sensation of victory beaming down on my face. I had won.

She took my hand to lead me to the car. But wait - weren’t they serving donuts after church? I turned around. “I want to go back in.”

She didn’t respond. She was not entertaining this plot twist and kept walking. I pulled in the opposite direction. Hard. Crying. Yelling. “I want to go back!” My grandmother didn’t get loud when she was upset - she got stern. Her tone did all the work. But I was committed. So, naturally, I escalated.

At the car, she picked me up. I writhed - then went rigid. Legs straight out. Feet planted firmly against the door. Body locked in full resistance. A human blockade between my grandmother and her car. But her will, it turns out, was slightly more established than mine. Eventually, exhausted, my knees bent, and she got me into the car. We drove home in silence. I had lost the battle. But I hadn’t gone quietly.

I love that little girl.

I didn’t care what other people thought - I wanted something, and I said it. Loudly. I had the audacity to change my mind - and fight for that too. That’s what I think self-love looks like – maybe sans the tantrum. But that was long before I knew it would be something I’d have to think about.

Somewhere between there and first grade, something shifted. I figured out tantrums were probably not my best strategy. But instead of finding a middle ground, I found something more efficient: being good. I could be good - simply by not being bad.

I hadn’t been punished into submission or shamed into silence. If anything, it was the opposite. It was what was missing when I stepped out of line - a subtle withdrawal, a shift in tone, a quiet disapproval that settled into the room. I adjusted accordingly.

I became the girl who didn’t make things difficult. The girl who didn’t disrupt. The girl who could be counted on to behave. If I didn’t make waves and stayed underneath the radar, no one would be disappointed. No one would be upset.

I followed the rules. I didn’t talk back. It sounds like every parent’s dream. But for me, it meant something else. It meant I had learned how to override myself.

But to me, it felt like I was becoming easier to love.

And in these small, reasonable moments, being easy starts to matter more than being honest. And the thing about that strategy - is that it works.

Which is exactly why it stays…

Meet Alice.

She knows how to shrink - just enough to be agreeable, but not enough to seem diminished. She’s outgoing. She’s perceptive. She pays attention.

She knows how to make it look like the decision is hers - even when it’s not.

Alice would never plant her feet against a car door and demand what she wants. Not like that little girl. Not anymore. Alice adapts. She gives people what they want. And she gets very good at it.

But what does that leave you with? I would say it leaves you lonely. It leaves you unable to connect on a deeper level - never seen for who you really are.

Saying you love yourself and living like you love yourself are not always the same thing. Self-love has been softened into something more palatable - bubble baths and “me time.” But the real version is less comfortable than that. Less aesthetic.

It looks like showing up as yourself - with needs, preferences, and occasionally inconvenient timing. It looks like pausing before you apologize and asking if there’s actually something to apologize for. It looks like coming right out and saying it without measuring how it will land.

Self-love is a return to who you were before you learned the art of the edit. Perhaps without the tantrums - or with them - but always with that same certainty that what you want matters. In the end, that little girl didn’t get what she wanted. But she knew what she wanted. And she let it be known.

Maybe we need a little more of that.