Most of us have felt capable and confident in one part of our lives, yet unexpectedly unsure of ourselves in another. We may know our subject well, have plenty of experience, and usually trust our judgement. Yet in the presence of a particular parent, manager, supervisor or other authority figure, something shifts. We become more careful, rehearse what we want to say, explain too much, worry about getting something wrong, or leave the interaction thinking about everything we wish we had said differently.
This can happen around people who carry authority, status, expertise or decision-making power, including parents, managers, supervisors, doctors, teachers, senior clinicians and other authority figures whose opinion or approval seems to carry particular weight. The reaction may be subtle, or we may feel noticeably younger, smaller, more compliant or more eager to please than we do in other relationships.
Gestalt therapy focuses on what happens between us and other people in the present moment, while recognising that we do not arrive in the present without a history. Over time, we learn what happens when we disagree, ask for help, make mistakes, show anger, need something or say no. Some lessons are taught directly; others are absorbed through repeated interactions and through the environments in which we grow up, study and work.
When Some People Make Us Feel Smaller
We may carry internal rules such as don’t make a fuss, don’t challenge authority, get it right, keep the peace, don’t look incompetent, be useful, or don’t upset anyone. These rules may once have helped us stay connected, avoid conflict, succeed or feel safe. The difficulty is that they can continue operating long after the original circumstances have changed.
In Gestalt therapy, absorbed rules and expectations such as these are sometimes described as introjects. An introject might sound like I shouldn’t question them, I should just be grateful, good employees don’t complain, I must get this right, or I shouldn’t need help. The rule can become so familiar that we barely notice it as a rule.
A tone of voice, a particular look, criticism, status or a difference in power may be enough to bring an old way of relating into the foreground. We may become quieter, more agreeable or more vigilant while paying close attention to how the other person is receiving us. The body can become involved too, through a tightening throat, shallow breathing, a churning stomach, a change in posture or the feeling of physically making ourselves smaller.
When We Hold Back or Go Along
At times we have something we want to say but cannot quite get it out. We want to object but remain silent, feel angry but criticise ourselves instead, want clarification but worry that asking will make us look foolish, or sense that something is not right and then spend hours wondering whether we are simply being too sensitive.
Gestalt therapists sometimes use the term retroflection to describe this turning back towards ourselves. What might have moved outward as words, protest, anger, need or boundary becomes self-doubt, tension, rumination or self-criticism instead. Holding back is not always unhealthy. Restraint can be thoughtful, protective or necessary. The question is whether we choose that response in the present or whether it happens so automatically that we have very little sense of choice.
Maintaining connection can also become so important that our own position blurs. Confluence describes this loss of differentiation between ourselves and another person. It may sound like Whatever you think is best, I don’t mind; it’s easier to go along with them, or I don’t want to cause any problems. Cooperation and compromise are important parts of relationships, but if keeping the peace repeatedly requires us to lose sight of our own preferences, needs or boundaries, our voice can become harder to hear.
These patterns can work together. We may carry an old rule such as I shouldn’t challenge authority, become agreeable in the moment to avoid conflict, and then turn the frustration back on ourselves afterwards: Why didn’t I say something? Why did I agree to that? Why do I always do this? I explored this idea of familiar patterns and how they may once have helped us adapt in Why Do I Keep Doing This?.
What Belongs to the Present, and What Comes With Us?
It is important not to explain every difficult response to authority as something left over from childhood or earlier relationships. Power can be very real. Managers assess performance, doctors influence treatment, supervisors shape professional development, and some people hold formal authority over decisions that matter to us. Some workplaces are punitive, some leaders are intimidating, and some environments genuinely make it difficult to speak freely.
A relational perspective therefore needs to include both the person and the environment. The more useful question is often not whether our response belongs to the past or the present, but how the two might be meeting. Someone in front of us may genuinely be dismissive or controlling while also touching an older experience in which disagreement, mistakes or speaking up carried a cost.
Self-monitoring can become particularly noticeable in these situations. Paying attention to how we come across is useful, but excessive self-monitoring can leave us watching ourselves rather than participating in the interaction. We may become preoccupied with saying the right thing, avoiding mistakes, managing the other person’s response or trying to work out whether we are acceptable.
Over time, this can affect much more than a single conversation. It can shape how freely we use our voice, how clearly we know what we think and how comfortable we feel occupying our own position in a relationship.
Finding Our Own Voice
Authenticity does not mean saying everything we think, refusing to compromise or behaving without regard for other people. All relationships involve adjustment, and sometimes choosing not to speak is wise.
The difficulty comes when adaptation becomes so habitual that we lose access to our own experience. If we continually ask what we should think, swallow what we want to say or adjust ourselves to keep someone else comfortable, it can become difficult to recognise what our own voice sounds like.
An introject can replace our voice with an inherited one, while retroflection can keep our voice from moving outward. Confluence can make it difficult to know where another person’s wishes end and our own begin. Together, these patterns can keep us present in a relationship while making us less present as ourselves.
Awareness can help us notice important differences: between I agree and I am afraid to disagree, between I am choosing not to say this and I feel unable to say this, or between this matters to us and I have lost sight of what matters to me.
Honouring Our Loss
These same relational patterns can shape how we experience grief and loss. Loss is deeply personal, yet many of us carry rules about what grief should look like, how long it should last and how much of it other people should have to see.
We may tell ourselves that we should be stronger, should be coping better, should not burden other people, should forgive, should be grateful or should have moved on by now. When these messages become louder than our own experience, we can find ourselves trying to have the grief we believe is acceptable rather than allowing ourselves to have the grief that is actually ours.
There may be anger, love, regret, relief, longing, guilt, unfinished business or feelings that do not fit neatly together. Retroflection can leave much of this turned inward, while confluence may make it difficult to separate our experience from the family or community story about what happened. We may find ourselves saying we’re all doing okay while privately knowing that our experience is very different.
Honouring a loss can mean allowing ourselves enough space to recognise: this is what I lost, this is what it meant to me, and this is how I am experiencing it. Other people may remember differently or grieve differently, and our experience does not have to disappear for us to remain connected to theirs.
Rebuilding in a Way That Fits
Loss and major life transitions often leave us with the task of working out what comes next. Rebuilding can require choices, experimentation, boundaries and a willingness to discover what fits now rather than simply returning to what was familiar before.
Old rules can follow us into this part of life too. I should stay in this job. I shouldn’t disappoint them. I should cope on my own. People my age don’t start again. I have to keep everybody happy. If these messages remain unquestioned, it is possible to rebuild a life that meets other people’s expectations while feeling increasingly disconnected from ourselves.
The energy needed for change can also get turned inward. Instead of asking for help, saying no, applying for something, leaving something, trying something new or setting a boundary, we may hesitate and then criticise ourselves for hesitating. If we are highly attuned to what everyone else needs, we may organise our next chapter around them without giving much space to the question: what do I want now?
Rebuilding does not necessarily mean dramatic reinvention. It may be much quieter than that, involving the questioning of an old rule, speaking where we would normally stay silent, tolerating another person’s disappointment, trying something unfamiliar or recognising that a role, relationship or way of living that once fitted no longer does.
Finding Our Place Without Losing Ourselves
Finding our place is not only about where we live, work or belong. It can also mean occupying our own position in a relationship without disappearing into somebody else’s expectations or shrinking because they hold authority.
We can remain connected without becoming identical, respect expertise without abandoning our judgement, and care deeply about another person while still having a boundary. Belonging does not require us to lose the capacity to say I.
When we notice ourselves feeling unexpectedly smaller around someone, curiosity can offer more than self-criticism. We might notice what happens in our body, what we are holding back, what we fear might happen if we disagree, whose rule we may be following, and whether this feeling is familiar from another relationship or another time in our lives.
Caution may be entirely appropriate in our situation. At other times, an old expectation may be shaping our response more strongly than we realised, and often there will be elements of both. Greater awareness does not remove difficult people, unequal power or complicated histories, but it can help us recognise what is happening and recover some choice in how we respond.
In that sense, finding more room for our own voice can become part of Honour Your Loss. Rebuild Your Life. Find Your Place. It is not about becoming louder or more confrontational, but about becoming more able to recognise what belongs to us, what we have inherited, what still serves us and what we may be ready to do differently.
