I learned how to disappear when I was twelve years old. Not literally, of course lol! But when my family moved to the United States, I quickly discovered that the easiest way to navigate an unfamiliar world was to be seen and heard as little as possible. The strange thing is, I hadn’t always been that way. As a child, I was cheerful, outgoing, and willing to make friends with almost anyone. Suddenly, I was the new kid in middle school, surrounded by a different culture, different people, and an environment I didn’t fully understand.
Being quiet felt safe because staying in the background allowed me to observe the people around me, understand my new environment, and figure out how I was supposed to fit into it. Eventually, I began making friends and building connections, and for a while, I started to feel comfortable again. Then high school came; those friendships faded, and once again, I had to start over. I slowly began meeting people and forming new friendships during my freshman year. Things were actually going pretty well. Then, just nine weeks into high school, my parents bought a house in a different school district, and I had to transfer schools. Apparently, nine weeks of social stability was getting a little too comfortable for me. Just as I had learned people’s names, figured out where to sit at lunch, and started feeling like I belonged, I was back at square one.
At some point, I became tired of starting over. I began to feel that pursuing friendships was pointless if circumstances outside of my control could take them away so easily. Instead of repeatedly putting myself in a position to lose those connections, I stopped trying as hard to create them, and I carried that attitude through the rest of high school and into college.
Then COVID happened. My first year of college was incredibly isolating, but that isolation also reminded me of something I had spent years trying to ignore: I genuinely loved being around people. By my second year, when the world began opening back up and I could interact with people again, I found myself craving the human connection that I had once convinced myself I didn’t need. At the same time, I realized that I had spent so much time trying to disappear that I wasn’t completely sure who I was anymore.
So, I started exploring. I began developing interests that genuinely excited me, not simply to make myself seem more interesting, but because I wanted experiences I could share with other people. I wanted reasons to start conversations, meet new people, and build connections again, and that was when I discovered fashion.
At first, fashion was simply something I enjoyed. I loved experimenting with clothing, learning about different designers, understanding silhouettes, and figuring out how I wanted to present myself. Over time, however, I realized that fashion was giving me something much more important: a way to connect with people. An outfit could start a conversation, and a shared interest in a designer could turn a stranger into someone I wanted to know. Clothes became a way of expressing parts of myself that I had spent years keeping quiet. Ironically, the person who had spent years perfecting the art of going unnoticed had developed a passion for one of the most visible forms of self-expression.
That is why my love for fashion has never really been just about clothes. Fashion became one of the ways I rediscovered my love for people. It helped me become curious again, expressive again, and willing to put myself in situations where connection was possible. What began as an attempt to develop a hobby ultimately helped me rediscover something that had always been part of me.
I wasn’t learning how to become outgoing. I was finding my way back to the cheerful kid who once believed he could make friends with anyone. After spending years learning how to disappear, fashion helped me learn the art of being seen.