“So, I’ve been struggling lately.” Natasha breathes into the microphone. “Like, really struggling. As in, I hit rock bottom and needed some serious professional help. And because I’m brown, I didn’t just get diagnosed with run-of-the-mill anxiety, okay? I wasn’t going to be an underachieving psychiatric case, thank you very much. I had some performance anxiety—when I’m here talking to you people—and major depressive disorder and intrusive negative thoughts and a little too much drinking. . . .”

Natasha can laugh because the diagnoses gave her something she didn’t expect: freedom. The freedom to know herself. The freedom to accept herself.

Someone yells, “You get me!”

Another voice emerges from the back corner: “Yes!”

Natasha points to the crowd and says, “I’m so glad I’m not alone.”

And then, from a place that feels like it’s outside herself, she says, “Who else understands what I’m saying?”

There’s a loud Wooo sound that Natasha usually associates with scenes in sitcoms where two people kiss. A woman says, “I feel you, girl!”

Cheers of agreement fill the room. Natasha grips the microphone, feeling connected to something greater. She focuses on the woman for a second who is nodding as if to say, Keep talking. She wonders how many people walk around every day carrying pain that nobody else can see.

“Shout-out to everyone out there holding a lot on the inside,” Natasha says, taking an unplanned departure from her routine as she thinks of something she wrote in her Moleskine notebook yesterday: Wounds don’t heal in hiding.

“Thank you!” someone says, then another “Yes!” and then a round of soft applause.

Because of the adrenaline, it takes her a second to process what just happened. She really said something that made another person feel understood? She took her pain—her fragile, fresh pain—and created something out of it? The realization fills her with a spark. There is no better rush than this. Feeling terrified and raw when she’s doing her comedy is a sign that she’s doing it right.

“You know what?” Natasha taps her sneakers on the microphone stand. “Surprisingly, some really good stuff came from my experience. I learned how to be more honest with myself and with other people. The other day, I was walking down Spring Street, and a random man told me to smile. Yup, a random older man just came up to me and told me what to do with my face. I bet the women here tonight know what I’m talking about.”

There’s a flurry of “YESes” and claps.