Masks, Fear and the Cost of Non-engagement

Lately, I’ve noticed how many people still wear masks — in hospitals, in cars, in daily life.

Sometimes it’s practical.

Sometimes it’s habit.

And sometimes, I sense, it’s something quieter.

Not fear as panic.

But fear as non-engagement with life.

Fear doesn’t always announce itself loudly.

Often it arrives dressed as responsibility, politeness, or caution.

It looks reasonable. Sensible. Even virtuous.

But over time, what begins as protection can quietly become withdrawal.

Staying partially unseen.

Keeping encounters flat.

Reducing contact — not just with illness, but with feeling, connection, and presence.

What feels like safety can become an illusion.

Because real safety doesn’t come from shrinking life.

It comes from capacity — the ability to feel, to regulate, to meet what arises and return to oneself.

The masks we still wear may also be a metaphor.

Invisible masks:

An inability to self-advocate.

A tendency to agree simply to avoid conflict.

A reluctance to take the very action one already knows is required —

in order to stay in integrity with the self.

Not because the step is unclear.

But because taking it would mean stepping into visibility.

Responsibility.

Choice.

Fear here doesn’t look dramatic.

It looks like waiting.

Like over-processing.

Like staying “almost ready.”

These invisible masks protect us from friction —

but they also protect us from movement.

Yesterday, something small but meaningful happened in clinic.

I shared a brief lesson I’d learned recently — about how easily credibility and “good causes” can be used to persuade, about how even intelligent, well-intentioned people can be caught out by manipulative narratives.

The patient laughed.

I laughed too.

Not as doctor and patient.

But as two humans acknowledging our shared vulnerability — despite titles, training, and professional identities.

Nothing collapsed in that moment.

My authority didn’t diminish.

The clinical frame didn’t blur.

No boundary was crossed.

What shifted was the quality of presence.

We were no longer hiding behind roles.

We were simply there — regulated, human, and awake.

And it struck me:

That moment felt safer than distance ever could.

Fear promises protection by asking us to engage less.

To feel less.

To arrive only halfway.

But the cost of that bargain is subtle and cumulative.

Reduced vitality.

Flattened connection.

A life lived just behind glass.

Engagement doesn’t mean recklessness.

Engagement is a choice made with discernment,

not the absence of it.

It means being resourced enough to meet life as it is —

without armour, without performance, without retreat.

The question isn’t whether masks should be worn or not.

That’s not the point.

The real invitation is quieter, and more personal:

What masks am I still wearing — visible or invisible —

that keep me from engaging more fully with life and staying in integrity with myself?

Not all at once.

Not dramatically.

Just enough to step forward —

and be here.