🪞
Mine
What I experienced. What I feel. What I choose to read, say, request, hide, or step away from. The Fence I can build on my side.
🚧
A Fence Adventure
Your Side of the Fence. My Side of the Fence.
You get to be you. I get to be me. And sometimes I need to decide what gets a front-row seat in my day.
A Real Story From Jenny's Trail
The Post Is Gone. The Feeling Isn't.
Jenny sometimes sees Facebook posts from people whose perspectives differ from hers. She cares about people having the freedom to think and choose for themselves. She also noticed that some posts left her feeling unsettled long after she had closed the app.
Eventually she hid some of those posts from her feed. Not a public announcement. Not a demand that anyone change. Just a quiet choice about what she wanted arriving in her day.
Then one day, a Facebook post about Pride stopped her in her tracks.
Jenny cannot remember the exact words. She remembers the post questioning the celebration of who people are. And she remembers the sadness.
She thought about people who have had to hide who they are, who have been excluded, or who have faced danger simply for being themselves. The post touched something she cares about fiercely: people's freedom to belong as themselves.
Her thoughts began to spin. She pulled her Parachute cord, gave herself room to settle, and chose to hide that person's posts too.
She considered unfriending the person, but she didn't. She wasn't trying to control what they posted or what they believed. She was choosing what she would keep inviting into her own feed.
Later, Jenny went looking for the post. It was gone. She felt glad to see it had been deleted. She doesn't know why it was posted or why it disappeared.
The words were gone. The feeling had stayed.
Dan had once shared a saying about how people may forget the words, but remember how someone made them feel. Jenny could not quote the post back. She could tell you what it had left with her.
Pause at the Fence
Two People. Two Kinds of Agency.
The person who posted had choices about what to share. Jenny had choices about what she read, followed, or hid.
Jenny couldn't choose that the words would never affect her. Feelings don't always wait for permission. But she could notice the impact, steady herself, and choose what happened next.
She didn't have to make the other person's Mirror wrong to recognize what was happening in hers.
Someone else can choose what to post. Jenny can choose what gets a place in her feed.
Her Fence was not a verdict about the person on the other side. It was a choice about access to her own space.
And Then There Was That Other Comment
What If Someone Wants to Move Your Fence?
Another time, Jenny used the word “kill” or “die” in a non-threatening context. She no longer remembers the exact wording. Someone commented that they disliked that word and told her she should use a different one.
There was an irony Jenny couldn't miss: the post itself had been about how we cannot control everything other people say or do, but we can work on how we respond.
The commenter could say the word bothered them. They could ask for something different. Jenny could listen, consider their request, change her wording—or decide not to.
Neither person's agency disappeared because the other had a preference.
“I hear that this word bothers you.”
“I'll think about what you said.”
“I understand your preference. I'm going to keep my wording.”
Those are possibilities, not required scripts. Sometimes Jenny may choose to change a word out of care. Sometimes she won't. The choice still belongs to her.
Look at the Landscape
Mine. Yours. Ours.
🌳
Yours
Your beliefs, words, feelings, and choices. Your reasons may be unknown to me. I don't need to invent them to decide what I need.
🤝
Ours
When we share a space, our actions affect others. We can ask questions, make requests, and agree on boundaries for that space without owning one another's Mirrors.
A Fence Is Not a Remote Control
What Can I Actually Choose?
Sometimes Jenny wants to say, “You have every right to your opinion, but you don't have a right to make me feel this sad.”
And then the Mirror offers a useful question: can another person really promise never to stir a feeling in us? Probably not. Jenny can't always control the first feeling either.
But she can decide whether to keep opening the same door. She can mute a feed, pause a conversation, ask for a change, leave, or return when she's ready.
None of those choices requires her to win an argument or prove that the other person is bad.
My Fence tells you what I will do with my space. It doesn't tell you who you must become.
One More Thing About Shared Trails
What About a Place We Share?
A personal feed and a shared gathering place are different landscapes. In a shared space, the people caring for that space can set expectations for how everyone is treated.
In the Sassiverse, curiosity and genuine questions are welcome—even when a Traveler is still learning. Belittling another person's identity, dignity, or belonging isn't something the shared space has to keep hosting.
A boundary can be firm without declaring that the person who crossed it is bad. A conversation can be paused or redirected. Harmful contributions can be removed. A learning trail may remain open when appropriate.
And no Traveler has to defend who they are in order to earn their place here.
We don't have to agree to belong. We do have to make room for one another's belonging.
Questions? Please ask. The Curiosity Lab would be delighted. It has been waiting for someone to bring a Rock. Possibly not an entire excavator this time.
Through Your Lens
What Is Your Fence Asking For?
What do I actually know happened—and what am I filling in about someone else's reasons?
What stayed with me after the moment passed?
Am I trying to change another person, or deciding what access I want to give something in my own life?
Is this my space, their space, or a space we share?
What would help me find my footing before I choose?
You might choose a tiny Fence, a mute button, a conversation, a Gate, or no action at all. You get to experiment with what fits your landscape.
What can I do?
Other Trails
Curiosity Can Wander
Each door stands on its own. Follow the one that interests you, or stay right here.
🎒Whose Stuff Is This?Untangle what belongs to you, what belongs to someone else, and what is shared.🪂The ParachuteWhen the feeling starts spinning, find a place to land before you decide.🚧Build the FenceGive the choice you can make a shape.🪞The House of MirrorsNotice what you know without writing someone else's story.