For a long time, I believed availability was proof of worth.
If I replied quickly, stayed flexible, adjusted my schedule, and showed up whenever needed, people would see my value. I thought presence created importance. I thought consistency guaranteed connection.
What I did not realize was that I was slowly teaching people how little it took to have access to me.
There was a phase in my life where my phone never felt quiet. Messages came in at all hours. Requests were constant. Conversations spilled into time that was meant for rest, for reflection, for work that mattered to me. I told myself this was a good thing. That being needed meant being relevant.
Yet something felt off.
I was everywhere, but I was not felt. I was involved, but rarely considered. Plans adjusted around me without my input. Decisions were made assuming my availability rather than respecting my time.
Nothing was taken from me aggressively. It was given away willingly.
One moment stands out.
I remember cancelling something important to me for the third time in a week because someone else needed help. Not urgently. Not desperately. Just conveniently. I agreed without hesitation. Later that night, alone, I felt an unexpected emptiness. Not exhaustion, but erasure. The uncomfortable realization that my life kept moving around me while I remained on standby.
That was the cost of endless availability.
When you are always reachable, your presence loses weight. There is no pause before you arrive, no consideration before you are included. People do not value what does not require intention. Access without effort does not feel special. It feels assumed.
This is not cruelty. It is human nature.
Scarcity creates attention. Boundaries create meaning. When something is always available, the mind stops registering it as valuable. It fades into the background, like noise you no longer notice.
I learned this slowly, and painfully. The more I gave without limits, the less I was truly seen. My kindness became expectation. My time became elastic. My energy became invisible.
And the most damaging part was internal.
I stopped treating my own time with respect. I interrupted myself constantly. I postponed my priorities without resistance. I told myself I would get to them later, once everyone else was settled. Later never came.
Being endlessly available did not make me generous. It made me absent from my own life.
Things changed the moment I began pulling back, not dramatically, not defensively, but intentionally. I started responding when I had space. I stopped rearranging my life for non essentials. I allowed pauses. I allowed disappointment. I allowed silence.
Some people reacted. Some drifted. Some stayed.
What surprised me was this. The people who stayed began to treat my presence differently. Conversations became more focused. Requests became clearer. Time spent together felt deliberate, not automatic.
My value had not increased. My visibility had.
Being less available made me more present. Present with myself first, and then with others.
Value does not come from how easily you can be accessed. It comes from the substance you bring when you arrive. From the clarity of your boundaries. From the respect you show your own life.
Being endlessly available does not make you valuable.
It makes you forgettable.
Choosing yourself does not mean disappearing. It means showing up with intention, with limits, with weight.
And that is what people remember.
