Why I Kept Hiding Even While I Was Doing the Work

by | Blog, Support for Black Women

Close-up of a Black woman’s face with shadows and light crossing her skin, representing why Black women hide

I was talking to my friend Chelsea recently about how long I have been doing this work.

I told her about the writing, the podcast, and the years I have spent creating a body of work around Black women and support. I told her about Support Languages™, the framework I developed to help Black women identify, communicate, and receive the support they need. We talked about how often I have returned to this work, even during the seasons when it would have been easier to walk away from it.

Then I had to admit something that did not seem to make sense alongside everything I had just said.

I have still been hiding.

Not from the work itself. I have been writing, podcasting, building the framework, and continuing to develop the ideas. I have shown up in ways that felt familiar and manageable to me.

I have been less comfortable with the visibility that comes with fully claiming what I have built.

There is a difference between doing meaningful work and allowing yourself to be known for it. I could publish an article, record another podcast episode, or spend hours developing Support Languages™ without having to say too loudly, “This is mine. I built this. And I believe it matters.”

The work felt natural. Claiming my authority within it did not.

For a long time, I told myself I was waiting until everything was ready. The website needed another revision. The framework needed more development. I needed a larger audience, another credential, or more evidence that people understood the value of what I had created.

There was always one more thing I could improve before becoming more visible.

Some of that was care. I take this work seriously, and I do not want to put something into the world before I have thought it through. But care was not the only thing happening. Perfection gave me somewhere to hide while still allowing me to say I was working.

And I was working. That is what made the hiding harder to recognize.

We tend to imagine hiding as doing nothing. We picture someone with a good idea who refuses to begin, a writer who will not write, or a woman who has convinced herself that she has nothing worth saying.

But hiding does not always look like absence.

Sometimes it looks like doing the work in places where you already feel comfortable while avoiding the opportunities that would place it before a larger audience. Sometimes it looks like saying you are “still developing” something you have spent years building. Sometimes it looks like waiting for someone else to recognize your authority before you are willing to name it yourself.

You can be productive and still be hiding.

You can be visible enough for people to know your name while remaining guarded about the depth and value of what you have created.

You can believe in the work and still hesitate to stand fully beside it.

I do not believe this experience belongs only to Black women, but I do believe visibility can be particularly complicated for us. Being seen does not always mean being understood. Our ideas may be questioned, separated from us, reduced to personal experience, or treated as less credible until someone else says something similar. Confidence can be interpreted as arrogance. Directness can become a problem that other people expect us to fix.

So I understand the instinct to make ourselves and our work less exposed.

What I no longer want to do is pretend that remaining less visible has protected me from disappointment, criticism, or being misunderstood. It has mostly made it harder for the work to reach the Black women I created it for.

That is the part I cannot ignore.

Support Languages™ did not come from a passing idea. It grew from years of listening to Black women talk about being loved but unsupported, surrounded but alone, and exhausted from trying to explain needs they did not yet have words for. I developed the framework, created an assessment, continued refining the language, and watched Black women recognize themselves in it.

At some point, repeatedly describing the work as though I am still deciding whether it deserves to exist becomes dishonest.

The work exists.

It has depth.

It is helping people.

And I am the woman who created it.

Saying that plainly still feels more vulnerable than doing another ten hours of work behind the scenes. But I am beginning to understand that I cannot separate the responsibility to develop the work from the responsibility to claim it.

That does not mean I suddenly want every kind of visibility. I am not interested in turning myself into someone who is constantly accessible, always on camera, or sharing parts of my life that I would rather keep to myself. Being more visible does not require abandoning my boundaries or forcing myself into forms of expression that do not fit me.

It means allowing my name to stand beside my work without immediately qualifying, minimizing, or explaining it away.

It means pitching the article.

It means talking about the framework before someone else decides I have earned the right to.

It means saying, “I created this,” without rushing to make the statement easier for other people to receive.

I do not have a dramatic announcement about coming out of hiding. I am not interested in presenting this as though one honest conversation with Chelsea ended every hesitation I have had about being seen.

But the conversation helped me recognize the difference between preparing the work and postponing my own relationship to it.

I have already done the work.

Now I am learning to let myself be known for it.

And for today, that begins with saying the sentence I have spent too much time whispering:

This is mine. I built it. And it matters.

 

Choose the Support That Meets You Where You Are:

Shirl Hubbard is the creator of Support Languages™ and founder of Shades of Strong®, a platform dedicated to shifting the narrative from Strong Black Woman to Supported Black Woman™. Through her writing, podcast, and original framework, she helps Black women identify, communicate, and receive the support they need.