The Modern Myth of Alignment
- Rachael Hibbert
- 3 days ago
- 5 min read
What it really says about who we are.
We like to tell ourselves that people grow apart, that paths diverge, that “energies shift.” But relationships don’t always just fade out. Someone leaves the building — even if they pretend they haven’t.
Somehow, in 2025, it’s become acceptable to see avoidance as self-care. The modern vocabulary of “alignment,” “boundaries,” and “protecting my peace” has given people a moral alibi for emotional laziness. Scroll through enough self-help accounts and you’ll find the same narrative repeated in soft pastel tones that reassure you that it’s right: if someone doesn’t align with your growth, let them go.
Cut ties with what doesn’t serve you! Protect your energy!
Except — people aren’t clutter. And ending a long-term friendship or relationship without communication isn’t spiritual maturity. It’s escapism dressed as enlightenment.
The Language of Avoidance
“Misalignment” has become our era’s favourite scapegoat. It sounds profound, but what does it actually mean?
More often than not, “we’re not aligned” really translates to: “I don’t want to face what being around you brings up in me.” It’s an elegant way of sidestepping accountability, of avoiding difficult conversations that might force self-reflection.
Alignment used to mean shared values, emotional rhythm, or purpose. Now it’s become a filter for discomfort — a word people use when they’d rather disappear than say, “I feel insecure,” or “I don’t know how to handle the version of you I’m seeing.”
We claim it’s about energy, but sometimes it’s about avoidance.
People talk about “outgrowing” others as if growth were a hierarchy. As if becoming more self-aware automatically places us above those who still struggle. But true growth includes empathy. It knows how to say goodbye with grace.
Psychological research affirms that real or perceived misalignment, sometimes termed “mate value discrepancy”, can increase dissatisfaction, but empathy and honest conversation change outcomes. It doesn’t need to pretend the other person is suddenly toxic, misaligned, or holding us back, or just no longer exists.
When we quietly erase someone, we’re not protecting our peace. We’re protecting our ego from confrontation. I know, because I’ve done it in smaller ways: taken longer to answer, let a silence stretch instead of naming my discomfort. Avoidance is a spectrum.
When Energy Gets Mislabeled As “Too Much”
Labelling someone “too much” is a convenient translation of that same discomfort. You’re not actually too emotional, too driven, or too expressive, you’re simply not so easy to contain.
Our culture still celebrates moderation as virtue. Passion, ambition, depth — they’re beautiful in theory, but exhausting up close. People love energy until it forces them to look at where theirs has stalled.
And women often get hit harder.
A woman with fire is “intense.” A man with sensitivity is “complicated.” A person who questions the unspoken rules of friendship is “draining.”
What we call “too much” is usually someone showing up without their filter. Someone living in real time, not in performance. Someone whose honesty or speed exposes the passivity in others.
We don’t actually fear intensity, we fear what it reveals about our own complacency.
The Mirror We Don’t Want to Face
When someone finds you overwhelming, it’s rarely about your volume. It’s about their threshold.
You might remind them of their own neglected ambition, the emotions they’ve numbed, or the courage they haven’t yet mustered.
But projection works both ways. Science now shows that emotional intensity, and what some label as “too much”, often reflects an ability to emotionally synchronize, which is critical for authentic relationships.
Sometimes, we label others as unmotivated, disconnected, or lost, when what we’re really seeing is our own fear of slowing down. Not everyone who chooses calm is stagnant. Some people are simply done performing. I’ve mistaken lack of contact for apathy, convinced myself their quiet meant regression.
There’s humility in admitting that projection is mutual. That what we see in others — the traits we judge, dismiss, or envy — are pieces of ourselves we haven’t made peace with yet.
Still, there’s a difference between self-awareness and self-blame. You can recognize your part in a dynamic without absorbing the guilt that isn’t yours.
The Modern Escape Route
Ghosting is not evolution. It’s cowardice normalized.
It’s easy to ghost when you tell yourself it’s spiritual. When you convince yourself that silence is “protecting your energy” instead of confronting your discomfort. But if I’m being honest: If you once shared laughter, tears, or trust with someone, vanishing isn’t emotional intelligence, it’s closer to disrespect.
Ghosting leaves the other person trapped in confusion, forced to rewrite history alone. They dissect every word, every moment, searching for the invisible crime they must have committed. It’s psychological abandonment disguised as serenity.
And for what? To avoid saying, “I’ve changed, we’ve changed, and I don’t know how to relate to you anymore”?
That’s all it would take, a single sentence. Respect is not silence. It’s the truth, even when the truth trembles and shakes.
The Myth of Too Muchness
So let’s come back to the you’re too much script. A few weeks ago, my shrink very cleverly asked me, are you too much, or is it just what you’ve been told to think?
Too loud. Too ambitious. Too honest. Too emotional. Too forward. Too anything.
This label doesn’t describe you, or me. It describes the space the other person is willing — or able — to hold.
People use “too much” to minimize what they can’t understand:
They pathologize energy they can’t match.
They moralize intensity to justify their retreat.
Your enthusiasm becomes “pressure.”
Your openness becomes “instability.”
Your drive becomes “judgment.”
But what they’re really saying is: “I can’t meet you here.” The truth is, there’s no such thing as being too much. There’s only being misplaced.
Owning Your Tempo
That doesn’t mean there’s nothing to learn. If you’re wired for movement, passion, and intensity, you have to learn rhythm, not apology. I’ve learned many times that intensity can connect or consume, depending on how I embrace it. Modulation isn’t dimming; it’s mastery. Knowing when to speak and when to listen. When to create space and when to fill it. When your energy expands connection, and when it unintentionally overwhelms it.
Self-awareness doesn’t mean containment; it means calibration.
You can hold your fire without burning down the room.
Redefining Respect
In an age obsessed with detachment, respect has been watered down into politeness. But real respect is emotional honesty. It’s being willing to speak up rather than slowly disappearing.
We’ve made confrontation sound cruel, but it’s one of the last remaining acts of care. Respect is not about constant presence and transparency. It’s not about staying aligned, but about leaving with integrity.
“It’s not emotional intelligence if it leaves someone else confused.” - Rachael Hibbert
Silence Speaks Louder Than Clarity
Boundaries aren’t the problem. It’s the way we use them to disguise fear that needs re-examining.
If someone’s silence is the cost of your truth, pay up. But don’t confuse their absence with evidence that you were wrong to speak, or to be, or to want. Sometimes people leave not because you’re too much, but because they can no longer hide from themselves when you’re around.
And sometimes, you’ll realize that your energy is best spent elsewhere — where it’s met, not managed.
Being “too much” is often just another way of saying you’re fully alive. You’re not meant to dilute your joy, your curiosity, your drive, or your honesty so that others can stay comfortable. The right people won’t call it excess.
So when someone quietly slips away, take a breath, let them. Because maybe the ones who find you overwhelming were never meant to be within your circle. And maybe, just maybe, being too much for the wrong people is exactly how you make space for the right ones.
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