judged

What is it that you experience when you feel judged by someone? When you think "they probably thought this" or "people will think this"?

What you're experiencing is nothing but your own thoughts. You project them onto others, but they arise in you. They are your own judgements turned upon yourself.

You've been pulling evidence here and there throughout your life to make these conclusions. Flippantly expressed judgements and reprimands from loved ones and strangers about your past attempts at self expression. They've become so fixed in your mind that on some level you believe everyone else will feels the same before you even attempt.

But it's only you. You can never really know what another person is thinking. Even if they tell you there's no way to know it was true. There are a thousand possible reasons someone might say something to someone else, including your friends to you, so there's never any good reason to personalize anything said to or about you. You simply do not know if it's true, and truth in the matter of self expression is so subjective that their truth on the matter will rarely align with yours.

And even if it was objectively true (which it can't be), why should this person's opinion dictate your behaviour? What do they really know about you? Even your closest friends? They can't know all that's gone into the person you've become. There's no way to adequately explain it, nor is there any reason to.

Do what you want to do. Hear the voice in your head when it condemns you and tells you what others will think or how they'll respond, and know that it's nothing but a thought in your head that was formed based on scraps of evidence from negative reactions in your life. Realize that it was initially formed to protect you in some way and that it can now be disregarded.

Do what you want to do. Especially when you hear that voice, the voice of self judgement. Test it and show it that it's wrong. Make it see over and over the fact that it's wrong, that it has always been wrong. Until it's not so loud anymore and eventually stops altogether. Don't hold yourself back from the world because of it. Show the world who you are. Let it see the beauty and creativity your body is bursting to let out in whatever form it wants to take.