Everything but Me

He gave everything to please – until there was nothing left.
A quiet ballad of self-erasure, fading identity, and the haunting silence that follows when you lose yourself trying to be enough for everyone else.

Lyrics:

Verse 1
In the dim light, shadows start to breathe
Fragments of a man, left underneath
Whispers in the dark, wearing down my name
I gave too much away - now I'm not the same

Verse 2
Every smile I faked, every need I hid
Every “yes” I gave, just to make them live
The mirror knows me, but not who I was
I traded truth for their applause

Chorus
I’m the shadow of me, hollow and thin
A ghost in my skin, where fire once lived in
All I gave to please, all I thought they'd see
Left me with nothing – everything but me

Verse 3
I wore their hopes like armor made of glass
Each step I took was just a way to pass
Through a world that asked for more than soul
And left me standing, half – but never whole

Bridge
Through the fog I walk, but I don’t arrive
Their voices echo, but I’m not alive
I disappear where the dim light glows
And no one sees the man it stole

Chorus
I’m the shadow of me, fading each day
A smile for the crowd, but I’m slipping away
All I gave to please, all I used to be
Left me with silence - everything but me

Solo

Outro
In the dim light, I whisper my name
But nothing answers - it all sounds the same

Story behind the song:

This track is about the slow erasure of the self – the price of giving everything to others until nothing remains but a hollow shell. The lyrics describe how masks, silence, and sacrifice can turn a person into their own shadow, present in the world but absent inside.

For me, this song is rooted in the reality of PTSD: the feeling of fading away, of not being seen. No one truly sees you – they only see the facade, the smile that hides the chaos within. You feel trapped inside yourself, as if behind an invisible wall, cut off from the world and from the people you love. Over time, you forget who you were before the trauma, and the emptiness that slowly takes over becomes heavier than the pain itself.

Sometimes all a person with PTSD needs is for someone to truly see them – and reach out a hand. I will never forget the day my wife took my hand and led me to a therapist. It was she who gave me the courage to open up everything I had carried inside. That single act broke the silence and reminded me that I was still here.

The image captures this perfectly: a man stands in dim light, his face heavy with silence, while his blurred shadow looms behind him. He is both present and not present, like an echo of himself. This is the truth of living as “everything but me” – existing in a world where you must be, and yet at the same time, not be.