The Conversation I Couldn’t Have

I was sitting in my car outside a relative stranger’s house, sobbing.

Just twenty minutes earlier, I’d been at what seemed like a perfectly pleasant outdoor gathering. I’d spent an hour and a half smiling, nodding, and asking all the right follow-up questions about weekend plans, restaurants, and the weather. By most measures, it was a social success.

So why was I falling apart?

The Setup

Three months after moving to a new city, the pandemic hit. Any chance I had of building connections disappeared overnight. As an introvert, making friends was already tough, but lockdowns made it nearly impossible.

When restrictions finally eased and a neighbor invited me to a backyard party, I knew I had to go. I was desperately in need of connection, even if I didn’t want to admit it. This felt like my chance.

The Performance

Once I arrived at the gathering, I slipped into my familiar role: the listener.

“What do you do for work?”
“Oh, how did you get into that?”
“That sounds interesting—what’s the most challenging part?”

The conversations flowed easily. People seemed happy to talk about themselves, and I was happy to listen. But as the evening wore on, something in me began to feel more and more hollow. Very few questions came back my way. When they did, they were quick and shallow, answered and brushed past. I almost felt like a prop: I served a purpose but no one really saw me.

I wasn’t really connecting. I was facilitating.

The Breakdown

When I got to my car, the tears came fast and hard. I was full-on sobbing, uncontrollably. The next day, more tears came. And more after those.

Once I’d calmed down a bit, I asked myself: What is this sadness really about?

The answer was devastating in its simplicity: I felt completely unseen.

Here I was, lonely and craving connection, yet I’d spent the whole evening learning about other people while sharing almost nothing of myself. Not because I didn’t want to, but because no one had asked.

It wasn’t malice. It wasn’t selfishness. But I suddenly saw a pattern that had followed me my whole life: I was always the one asking, always the one making space for others, always the one listening.

And I was exhausted.

The Recognition

I wasn’t just sad about one night. I was grieving a lifetime of one-sided conversations.

All the times I’d been called a “great listener” or “the office therapist” but walked away feeling invisible.
All the relationships where I knew someone’s story inside and out, while they knew almost nothing of mine.
All the times I left social situations feeling lonelier than when I arrived.

The pandemic had stripped away my distractions and forced me to face the truth: I was starved for the experience of being truly heard.

The Connection

That night planted a question I couldn’t shake: if I felt this starved for connection, how many others were quietly carrying the same hunger to be heard?

I wasn’t just craving conversation. I was craving curiosity. Curiosity about me—my life, my thoughts, my inner world. And if I was aching for that, surely I wasn’t the only one.

How many people were going through their days asking the right questions, facilitating conversations, being “good listeners,” while secretly longing for someone to turn that same attention toward them?

How many were leaving social situations feeling lonelier than when they arrived?

What I Learned

Being lonely isn’t always about being alone. Sometimes it’s about being surrounded by conversation yet starving for connection.

There’s a difference between talking and being heard. Between social interaction and true curiosity.

Most of us know how to look socially functional while hiding our deeper selves. We move through the world emotionally invisible.

And it hurts.

Why This Matters

That night in my car clarified everything for me.

People don’t always need advice. They don’t always need solutions. What they long for is the relief of being seen, heard, and witnessed by another human being.

That’s why I created Objective Listening.

Because you deserve more than small talk. You deserve what I was craving that night—the profound experience of being fully listened to.

✨ If you’ve ever left a social gathering feeling more lonely than when you arrived, you’re not alone. And you don’t have to carry that ache forever.

👉 If you’re ready to experience judgment-free listening, you can book a session here.