The Night I Put a Blanket Over Me to Film a Reel
On the terror barrier, the fear that points you forward, and what happens when you do the thing anyway.
I remember it so clearly. My family was in bed. Nobody knew what I was doing — and honestly, I wouldn't have been able to tell anyone even if they'd asked.
I was standing in our hallway holding my phone in front of my face, trying to film a sixty-second reel. I had been standing there for almost two hours. At some point I grabbed a blanket and pulled it around my shoulders — not for warmth. I just needed something around me. Something that felt like protection.
I still couldn't do it.
Here's the thing that made it feel so impossible: I had spent years telling anyone who would listen that social media wasn't for me. I don't want to show off. I don't want to perform. That whole world just isn't me. And then I decided I wanted to open an online coaching business — in English, in Germany — and suddenly I was standing in my hallway at night with a blanket over my head, arguing with myself about a sixty-second video.
The shame of that contradiction was almost louder than the fear itself.
What was actually happening
It wasn't really about the reel. I can see that now. It was the first time I had honestly looked at myself — really looked — and noticed all the things sitting underneath. The not feeling beautiful enough. The not feeling worthy enough. The voice that said: who do you think you are, putting yourself out there like that?
Even with years of psychology books, spirituality, self-development — even with all of that in me — I couldn't override it. Because knowledge doesn't always reach the nervous system. And the nervous system was running the show that night.
My first mentor called it the terror barrier. The threshold between who you've been and who you're becoming. It feels like the most horrible, most impossible thing. It feels like you might actually not survive it. And then you step through — and you realise you're still standing. The world is still spinning. And something has quietly, permanently shifted.
I finally did it. From my hallway floor.
That night, eventually, I did it. I filmed something. I don't remember what I said. I remember that my shoulders dropped about a mile afterwards — that specific kind of exhale that comes when you've been bracing for so long you forgot you were doing it.
I felt a door opening. One of those big, heavy old wooden doors you find in churches or temples. The kind that takes effort to move. And I thought: this is going to be a fun ride.
That was four years ago. Since then, I have made at least one video every single day. Instagram, TikTok, YouTube — I've tried all of them. Not to prove anything to the world. To prove something to myself. That I'm not that girl who hides anymore. That the soul call is louder than the ego.
And now? I miss it when I don't make a video. I genuinely miss the act of speaking, of showing up, of saying the thing out loud. I don't depend on it — but I love it, so I do it.
For you, if you're standing in your own hallway right now
Maybe it's not a reel. Maybe it's a DM you haven't sent. A conversation you've been avoiding. An offer you haven't put out yet because the voice keeps asking who do you think you are?
Just for a second — without needing to actually do anything yet — feel into what it would feel like if you'd already done it. Not while you're doing it. After. How would you feel if you'd already filmed that video? Already sent that message? Already shown up in the way your soul keeps nudging you toward?
That feeling is real. That version of you is real. And she's not as far away as the terror barrier makes her seem.
The fear that feels like a stop sign? Ninety-five percent of the time, it's actually a compass. We're not talking about standing on the edge of a twenty-floor building. We're talking about the fear of being seen. Of saying the thing. Of doing the thing your soul calls you to do while your ego pulls every trick it has to keep you small.
That fear is growth pain. And growth pain means you're right at the edge of something real.
If this landed for you — I'd love to hear what your "hallway moment" is. The thing your soul keeps calling you toward. Leave it in the comments, or come find me. That's exactly why I started the face-to-camera thing in the first place.
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