You Could Never Walk in My Shoes

People love to talk about resilience. They throw the word around like confetti, as if it’s just about enduring a bad day, failing a test, or picking yourself up after some minor inconvenience. They call someone strong because they kept going after a breakup, because they lost a job and found another, because life knocked them down and they got back up. But resilience isn’t pretty, and it sure as hell isn’t romantic. It’s not something you cultivate by reading motivational quotes or listening to self-help podcasts.

Resilience is clawing your way out of the darkest corners of existence with nothing but your own willpower. It’s dragging yourself forward, even when every part of you is screaming to give up. It’s learning how to stand on your own when no one is there to catch you. It’s walking through fire with no guarantee that there’s something waiting for you on the other side—no certainty, no safety net, no comforting words to reassure you that it’s all going to be okay. It’s surviving not because you had a choice, but because there was no other option.

Most people don’t know what it’s like to be discarded. To be told—explicitly or otherwise—that who you are is unacceptable. That you are too much, too different, too difficult to love. That no matter how much you try to fit, you never will. That no matter how much love you give, it will never be enough to make them stay. They don’t know what it’s like to be sixteen and suddenly find themselves without a home, without security, without a family to fall back on. They don’t know what it’s like to realize, in a single moment, that everything they thought was permanent could disappear. That love could be conditional. That survival could be a solo act.

And here’s what they don’t tell you about losing everything: there’s no grace period. No slow adjustment. No moment to catch your breath. You don’t get to fall apart. When survival is your only option, there’s no space for self-pity. No time to mourn the version of life you thought you’d have. You learn, almost instantly, that every single decision from that moment forward is about making it to the next day. You figure out how to move without a map. You calculate your risks, you weigh your options, and you force yourself to keep going—even when the road ahead is pitch black and uncertain.

So I did what I had to do. I adapted. I learned how to stand on my own, how to navigate a world that wasn’t built for me, how to create opportunities out of nothing. I became fluent in resilience in a way most people never will. I built myself from the ground up with nothing but determination and a refusal to let anyone else define my worth. I walked into rooms I had no business being in. I took risks that people told me I wasn’t ready for. I made sure that my existence would never be erased, never be forgotten, never be dismissed as anything less than extraordinary.

But let me tell you something: none of this made me cold. It made me unstoppable.

I have seen the worst of people, and yet, I am still here. I have been rejected by the very people who were supposed to love me unconditionally, and yet, I have built a life richer and more fulfilling than they could ever imagine. I have been left with nothing, and yet, I have created everything. And I did it all without compromising who I am.

People look at me now and see strength, ambition, confidence. They see the success, the resilience, the fire that refuses to die. But what they don’t see are the scars beneath it all—the nights spent wondering if I’d ever belong anywhere, the moments where the weight of it all felt unbearable, the constant fight to prove—to myself more than anyone else—that I am worth everything they tried to take from me.

And that’s the thing. People think they understand, but they don’t. They think they could have handled it the way I did, but they wouldn’t have. They think resilience is something you choose, when in reality, for people like me, it’s the only option we’ve ever had. They see the success but not the sacrifices. They see the confidence but not the years of fighting for a voice. They see the person standing tall but not the nights I spent on my knees, begging the universe for a break.

They don’t know what it’s like to start over with nothing but yourself. To build from ashes, with no blueprint, no safety net, and no certainty that it will ever be okay. They don’t know what it’s like to wake up every morning and remind yourself why you’re still fighting. They don’t know what it’s like to carry the weight of an entire past that tried to break you while building a future that refuses to let it.

So no, you could never walk in my shoes. You could never carry the weight I have carried, never rebuild from the destruction I was left with, never endure what I have endured and come out the other side with fire still burning in your eyes.

But that’s okay.

Because I didn’t survive for them to understand. I didn’t build myself so others could validate my pain. I didn’t fight my way through hell just so someone else could look at my journey and say, “Wow, that must have been hard.” I didn’t rise from the ashes for their approval, their sympathy, or their admiration.

I survived for me.

I built my life for me.

I became unstoppable for me.

And that is more than enough.