When the Smile Doesn’t Reach Your Eyes
Growing up, I was told alcohol was bad. I was warned: “You don’t want to end up like your grandfather,” a man I never met, but whose story ended in cirrhosis. “Don’t be like your father,” I heard, again and again. The message was clear: people I loved were broken. And somehow, if I wasn’t careful, I would be too.
So I feared alcohol. But I also saw it—at parties, family gatherings, on TV. It wasn’t just a substance; it was part of the culture. I internalized the fear, but I also absorbed the contradiction.
When I finally went to rehab, then to AA, I learned to manage the behavior. But the pain underneath? The reason I ever picked up a drink? That got maybe 15 minutes with a counselor here or there.
AA tells you the problem is that you lack a relationship with a Higher Power. And for many, that path works beautifully. But what it did for me was tie my identity to alcohol forever. I wasn’t just a person who drank—I was “an alcoholic.” I was someone who would always be at risk, someone who must live in constant vigilance.
That kind of identity creates fear. Anxiety. And for me, it kept me orbiting around the very thing I was trying to escape.
But here’s what I realized:
The real issue was not alcohol.
It was belonging.
I never felt seen.
Not by my parents.
Not in my relationships.
Not in my body.
Not as a gay Black opera singer trying to find his voice in a world that didn’t know what to do with any part of that sentence.
I drank because I felt disposable. Because the only thing people valued was what I could do—not who I was.
And here’s the truth:
Until we feel unconditionally loved—by someone, by ourselves, by something—we will always look for a substitute.
For some, that’s alcohol. For others, it’s success, validation, sex, control, or chaos.
But all of it—every addiction, every compulsion—is a survival strategy built around identity.
So when we talk about recovery, or healing, or change, we can’t just talk about behavior.
We have to talk about who we believe we are.
Because when you feel like you don’t matter, nothing you do will ever be enough.
True healing begins when we stop trying to prove our worth—and start learning how to see ourselves with the love we’ve always needed.
That’s the power of identity. And for me, reclaiming mine was the real recovery.
But how do we get here? To this need for an identity reboot?
It starts early.
We grow up with a narrative of how life is supposed to work.
We’re taught what’s good and bad.
Who’s good and bad.
How we’re supposed to feel when something “bad” happens—or when something “good” does.
We don’t realize it, but we’re absorbing a script.
Not just about the world, but about ourselves.
We get a curated education—sometimes from parents, sometimes from teachers, culture, the internet, religion, or trauma.
And over time, we mistake that curation for truth.
If someone tells you often enough that your feelings are too much, you learn to bury them.
If they tell you your dreams are unrealistic, you learn to shrink.
If they tell you you’re “bad” or “broken,” you start to believe that your very being is the problem.
And if they praise your performance, but never your presence, you learn to equate worth with utility.
We form an identity around survival—not authenticity.
And when the pain of living someone else’s story becomes too much to bear, we look for relief.
Alcohol was that relief for me. For others, it might be something else.
But the turning point—the need for an identity reboot—comes when you realize:
This life I’m living doesn’t feel like mine.
That’s not a failure. That’s a signal.
That’s where healing begins.
Have you ever seen someone flash an empty smile?
It’s what happens when your face makes the shape—
but your eyes still show the terror, the ache, or the hollowness
of walking a path you now realize you never really chose.
That smile says,
“I’m still here. I’m still playing the part.”
But the soul behind it is somewhere else—grieving a dream, a self, a sense of safety that was lost somewhere along the way.
It is the look of someone who reached the destination and thought, “This is it?”
Because the truth is, we are told the outputs will bring the feelings.
Get the job → feel worthy.
Find the partner → feel loved.
Stay sober → feel whole.
Be successful → feel safe.
But when those outcomes don’t deliver the promised emotion, we do not just feel disappointed—we feel defective.
Like we missed a step. Like it worked for everyone else and not for us.
How come I’m not happy yet?
How come I’m not rich yet?
But we take these acquisitions as steps to wholeness, so naturally, we have to play the part.
And so we smile. We perform.
But deep inside, we wonder if we’ll ever feel like we’re really living.
The Hollowness Is the Signal
You don’t have to fall apart to know something isn’t working.
Sometimes the emptiness is loud enough.
Sometimes the smile feels heavy enough.
Sometimes the days feel hollow enough to whisper:
This is not it.
That’s not failure.
That’s awakening.
It is the moment you stop asking, “What else do I need to add?”
And start asking, “What needs to be reclaimed?”
Not a new performance. Not a better mask.
But the thread of who you were before you were taught to hide.
Before you learned to fear your truth.
Before you were told that belonging only comes at the cost of yourself.
Finding the thread doesn’t happen all at once.
It begins in quiet moments.
In telling the truth, even just to yourself.
In noticing what drains you—and what feels like home.
In realizing that your life isn’t meant to be a constant performance.
The real recovery, the real healing, is not just about quitting the thing that numbed you.
It is about choosing yourself—not the version of you others accepted, but the version you’ve always been becoming.
You don’t need to become someone else.
You need to remember who you are beneath the story.
That’s the thread.
And once you find it—you don’t have to pretend anymore.
You get to build a life that feels like yours.