𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗖𝘂𝗹𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗮𝗹 𝗦𝗲𝗹𝗳 𝗜𝘀 𝗡𝗼𝘁 𝗠𝗼𝗻𝗼𝗹𝗶𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗰

Sara (name changed), a woman in her early 30s, walked into my clinic wearing a hijab. Without realizing it, I found myself anticipating themes of restriction—perhaps she would talk about feeling torn between duty and independence or about wanting to push back against certain norms.

Yet, as Sara spoke, her words didn’t fit the narrative I had unconsciously constructed. She described her love for her work, her global travels, her financial independence, and her deep engagement with philosophy and art. She spoke about feeling too privileged at times, not restricted.

As she spoke, I noticed something within me—an almost imperceptible disappointment. It was fleeting, barely conscious, but it was there. A part of me had been prepared for a different kind of conversation, one about cultural constraints and rebellion. But that was not Sara’s experience, and I had to catch myself in that moment. That small, internal disappointment told me something about my own expectations, my own narrative frameworks. Rather than ignoring this reaction, I decided to use it in the session itself.

I took a pause and said, “Sara, I want to share something I just noticed in myself. As I was listening to you, I realized I had a quiet assumption about what your struggle might be—something about gender norms, family expectations. But as you speak, I’m seeing how different your experience is from the narrative I had in my mind. I’m curious—do you find that people often assume a particular struggle for you, one that doesn’t actually fit?”

Sara smiled knowingly. “All the time,” she said. “People either expect me to be struggling against my culture or fully embracing it. No one really sees that I am struggling with belonging. In elite, Westernized spaces, I feel subtly excluded, reduced to a stereotype of an oppressed Muslim woman. In some Muslim circles, my class privilege makes me feel alienated from those who struggle with finances. I am not navigating a fight for freedom—I am navigating a fight for recognition in spaces that never seem to fully embrace me. It’s like people can only see the hijab, not the whole picture of who I am.”

That moment shifted the session. It gave Sara space to name something she hadn’t explicitly articulated before: the frustration of being misread, of not being given the complexity she actually lived. From that point forward, our work became about how she holds these contradictions—about how she remains grounded in her identity even when others flatten it.

As therapists, we often bring histories, expectations, and narratives we’ve internalized. The work is not about eliminating these—it’s about noticing them, engaging with them, and ensuring that they serve the client rather than subtly shaping their story.

Have you ever felt misread in a way that erased the complexity of your experience? How do you navigate the tension between different aspects of your identity?

-Written By Anisha Pandya