Steiger’s Substack

Steiger’s Substack

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Steiger’s Substack
Steiger’s Substack
Why You Shut Down When It Gets *Too Real*

Why You Shut Down When It Gets *Too Real*

And what to do when you’re finally ready to feel again

Steiger Neils Bryke's avatar
Steiger Neils Bryke
Jun 15, 2025
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Steiger’s Substack
Steiger’s Substack
Why You Shut Down When It Gets *Too Real*
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Hey, I think I shut down when things get hard. Can we hang out sometime?

Jules stared at that single, trembling sentence for twenty-two minutes before he thumbed Send.
No emoji. No lol. No jokey buffer to blunt the edge. Just that: a raw, exquisite risk sent into the silence of a Wednesday night in early March.

It was 11:03 p.m. The apartment hummed—radiat…

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