I Went to See Barbie. I Left Seeing Myself.

Barbie was much more than a film. It was a reckoning. It was pink and glossy and glittering on the outside, but underneath, it was full of truths many women are too scared to say aloud.

It told the story of girlhood, and of womanhood, with such honesty and imagination that it became something more than a movie. It became a memory I didn’t know I had. It reminded me (and maybe reminded you too) of all the ways we’ve learned to hide ourselves in order to be accepted.

So many of us grow up learning to be liked instead of known. To be polished instead of present. We master the art of being “easy” to be around, quieting our feelings, shrinking our dreams, and making sure everyone else is comfortable before we ask ourselves if we are.

There’s a moment in Barbie where the world slows down. A piano melody floats in, and suddenly, it’s not just a movie anymore, it’s a mirror. I have never, in my life, been so moved by a moment in cinema.

I sat there in the theater and felt something shift. I’ve always dreamed of working behind a camera, of creating stories on film, but that dream has often felt distant, especially in a space still dominated by male voices. And then, in the most tender moment of the film, Barbie begins to imagine real life and the screen fills with home videos. Not actors, not sets. Real memories. Real women. Footage submitted by the cast and crew.

That choice to include real, personal moments from the people who made the film felt like an invitation. Like proof that the ones behind the camera mattered just as much as the ones in front of it. For the first time, I didn’t just want that dream. I believed it could belong to me.

This story isn’t about Barbie. It’s about all of us; the way we learn to perform, to present perfection, and the courage it takes to undo that. In the movie, Barbie begins on that tightrope too: smiling, pristine, built to be everything for everyone. But as the story unfolds, she unravels into emotion. Into autonomy. Into humanity.

And somewhere in that unraveling, I saw my own reflection.

I’ve been learning to drop the performance, too. To stop people-pleasing just to avoid rejection. To show up as myself, even if it means not everyone will approve. And yes, some people haven’t. But the love I’ve received since being real, raw, imperfect, fully me, is deeper than anything I ever found by being agreeable.

That’s what Barbie gave us. Not just clever commentary or iconic fashion. But permission. Permission to feel too much. To dream too loudly. To take up space. To become something more than what we were told we had to be.

And if you’re still somewhere on that tightrope trying to be liked, trying to be perfect, trying not to be too much, I hope you know this:

You were never meant to be easy to swallow. You were meant to be fully seen.

You don’t have to be everything. You just have to be you.

And that, in every way that matters, is more than enough.