Taking up space.

There was something I loved
about modelling.

It wasn’t the cameras.
It wasn’t the runway.
It wasn’t even the clothes.

It was something
much quieter.

For a moment,
I didn’t have to apologize
for taking up space.

At six foot one,
I have spent much of my life
trying to become
a little smaller.

Standing differently.

Softening my presence.

Wondering
if I was too much.

Too tall.
Too noticeable.
Too visible.

But on the runway,
everything changed.
I was meant
to be seen.

My height
wasn’t something
to hide.

It was an asset.

The clothes needed space.
The designer’s vision
needed presence.

My job
was simply
to walk.

To embody.

To allow people
to see.

There was something
deeply freeing
about that.

Not because people
were looking at me.

But because
for once,
I didn’t have to shrink
to make anyone else comfortable.

It was on my terms.

I chose to be there.

I chose
to be visible.

I chose
to occupy the space
I had always occupied,
only this time
without apology.

That feeling
has stayed with me.

Because perhaps
the runway
was never really
about fashion.

Perhaps it was teaching me
something much bigger.

That taking up space
is not arrogance.

It is not selfishness.

It is not asking
for too much.

It is allowing yourself
to exist
fully.

Many of us
become experts
at making ourselves smaller.

We lower our voices.
We minimize our achievements.
We hesitate
before sharing an idea.

We apologize
before speaking.

We question
whether we belong.

Little by little,
we disappear
from our own lives.

Yet the world
does not benefit
from smaller people.

It benefits
from authentic ones.

People
who know who they are.

Who speak honestly.

Who stand comfortably
in their own presence.

Who no longer believe
they must earn
their right
to be here.

The older I become,
the more I realize
that confidence
is not becoming bigger.

It is simply
stopping the habit
of becoming smaller.

Perhaps we all have
our own runway.

A place
where we finally realize
that we were never meant
to apologize
for our presence.

We were meant
to inhabit it.

Fully.
Gracefully.
Without shrinking
for anyone.

Because the space
you occupy
has always been yours.
​
You never had to ask
permission
to stand in it.