RIP to Being Misunderstood: How to Stop Censoring Yourself In Your Content
Ep. 9 RIP to Being Misunderstood
There are parts of you that want to come out and play.
And there are probably parts of you you’ve decided aren’t allowed in your brand.
In this episode of The Midnight Edit, I’m sharing a moment from an Akashic Records reading that forced me to confront my fear of being misunderstood — and what shifted when I let that go.
In this episode, I’m sharing:
My journey from academic strategist to fully integrated, embodied brand
The tension between intellect, spirituality, structure, and expression
Why siloing parts of yourself creates friction in your content
The difference between clarity and self-censorship
Why your messaging works as an ecosystem, not a single post
The question I’m sitting with when I feel tempted to hold myself back
If you’ve been editing yourself to stay palatable or predictable, this one will probably land.
Mentioned Resources
Hilary Pearlson - she is my go-to reader and expert for the Akashic Records. A reading with her is truly such a life-changing (and business changing experience!)
Episode Transcript
RIP to being misunderstood. That’s what my guides told me.
I want to tell you a bit of a story. I want to take you behind the scenes of this brand evolution journey that I’ve been on. I’ve been speaking about it in previous episodes, but there was a really interesting edge that I came up against quite recently.
A huge part of this brand evolution has been allowing all parts of myself to come forward in my content in a way that is far less siloed than I was comfortable with.
Now the backstory is that my whole life I’ve been very much a logical, in-my-head kind of person. I was your classic straight-A student, total band nerd. I was definitely in seven bands in high school, including pit band and marching band. I had the academic career. I was deep in academia, doing my research and getting my master’s degree.
Then I moved into the corporate world where I was doing corporate training, HR work, developing training programs and certification programs for universities and government institutions.
All of this was very intellectual. Very academic. Cite your sources. Have your research. Be in your head.
A huge part of my journey in my business has been landing and arriving in my body, in my spirituality, in my energetics, in my full fiery Leo self. There would be moments where I would let it out to play.
I remember having one client say to me, “You’re kind of woo. I want you to bring that out a little bit more. I want you to talk about the fact that you have crystals and read tarot and these types of things.”
This was years ago. I wasn’t even that woo back then.
I was like, okay, maybe I’ll talk about that a bit with my clients. But I wasn’t comfortable bringing it forward fully in my content, in my brand.
Now the reason I’m talking about this today is because this is something I am seeing so much with my clients, with my peers, with my colleagues. There are parts of ourselves that are longing to come out to play. They’re ready. And we have created brands and businesses where it feels like it’s only acceptable to let certain parts of ourselves out.
The strategic, intellectual self? She’s allowed out. People are going to pay her.
The fun, silly self? She can come out around friends. She can come out behind the scenes in paid containers where it feels comfortable and people are already in the door, but she definitely can’t come out in content.
I remember having this conversation with a client because she had an incredible sense of humor. She was spicy. She wasn’t afraid to say the sharp thing in a very pointed, dry way.
I said, that is amazing. I want to hear that tone in your email marketing.
She said, “Oh no. I could never.”
This is a trend I see really often.
There are so many different parts of us. The serious academic. The person who nerds out over spreadsheets. The one who’s deep into astrology. The one who wants to have dance parties at midnight.
So many different parts. And then we silo them.
You’re welcome in this area of my life.
You’re welcome in this part of my business.
You’re allowed out here, but not there.
What ends up happening is this sense of being fractured. And it creates tension, especially when we sit down to write.
We start censoring ourselves.
“I shouldn’t say this.”
“I should say that.”
“My content should perform.”
It sucks all the fun out of it. It makes it feel like, I don’t want to write. I don’t want to work on this. And then everyone says, why is content marketing the worst?
It’s because we’re not having fun.
I was struggling with this a lot. I realized that with every facet of myself, I was creating a shadow side that I was afraid of people misunderstanding.
If I lead with the strategic and intellectual side, which is definitely my comfort zone, I might only attract people who want spreadsheets and structure, and not the ones who crave deeper connection to their body and intuition. Not the ones who resonate with pleasure and celebration as a core part of grounding into brand expression and growth.
But if I talk about being in your body and pleasure and celebration, will people misconstrue me as one of those coaches asking you to check in with your downstairs before making decisions? No shade to those people. That’s just not my style of coaching.
Then there’s the spiritual side of myself. I check in with what the planets are doing. I look at moon phases. I check in with my cards. I consult my guides.
But I don’t want people to think everything is ungrounded and purely energetic, and that there isn’t the strategic infrastructure that is one of my zones of genius.
This brings us to… the Akashic Reading
So this brings me to a few weeks ago, when my dear friend and absolutely incredible Akashic Records reader, Hilary Pearlson, was doing a reading for me.
She’s amazing. I’m going to link her in the show notes. Her programs are life-changing. Readings with her are incredible. If you’re curious about the Akashic Records, you absolutely need to connect with Hillary.
I brought all of this into the reading. All of these concerns about the shadow sides. Why I can’t be this and I can’t be that. What if I’m too much of this or too much of that?
My guides got a little bit sassy with me.
The image that came through was all of us gathered around a tombstone that read:
RIP: Here lies Misunderstood Emily.
The message was clear.
Goodbye to being misunderstood.
That is not a useful expenditure of energy right now.
I realized I would never let my clients get away with this. But it’s so hard to take our own advice.
Our job is not to control every possible narrative that people might have about us.
Our job is not to be hyper-focused on whether we’re going to be misunderstood.
Our job is to demonstrate that we understand our people so deeply.
We understand where they’re at. Their pains. Their desires. What’s underneath. What’s going on in their life. What they need to move forward. What they like to do for fun.
We see them. All of them.
And our job is to bring all parts of ourselves forward into our brand.
Now I want to put a caveat here, because the strategist in me has opinions.
Yes, we absolutely want clarity. We want to be known for something specific. We don’t want people confused about what we do or how we do it.
Our messaging, our content, our marketing — it’s an ecosystem. It does not exist in a void.
Someone isn’t going to come across one post and that’s the only thing they ever interact with. If it resonates, they’ll explore. They’ll read more posts. They’ll check emails. They’ll sign up for funnels. They’ll listen to podcasts.
We don’t have to make every single piece of content do every single thing.
That’s not what I mean when I talk about being misunderstood.
And the second thing is this: when I say bring all parts of you forward in your brand, I mean the parts that want to come forward.
The parts that are excited to play. The parts that want to get funny and weird. The parts that want to share more about your worldview, how you use the lunar cycle to plan your launches, or your deep rabbit-hole research on a niche topic.
Those are the parts we bring forward.
There may be parts of you that you want to keep just for you and your personal life. Go for it. You are never obligated to showcase parts of yourself that you don’t want to as part of your marketing.
I’m not talking about exploiting your life for brand authenticity.
I’m talking about bringing forward the parts of you that want to come out and play. And being honest about the narratives you’re carrying around why that’s not safe or not comfortable.
So my invitation to you is this:
If you knew nothing bad would happen, and you knew it would magnetize your dream clients, your dream goals, your dream revenue, what would you do?
What would feel ridiculously fun?
What’s the wild idea you’ve been sitting on that feels too edgy?
You don’t even have to do it.
But if it’s stirring something in you, DM me. Send me a message on Instagram.
If there’s a part of you you’re wondering how to weave into your business and your brand, let’s talk.
I would love to hear what you’re working on.
✨ Let’s keep the conversation going
I’d love to hear what stood out for you in this episode - feel free to send me a DM on Instagram @emily.mwalker (it's my fav place to hang out!)
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