I am not here to survive the world—I am here to reshape it.
I carry the wisdom of generations, and I am remembering who I am.
There was a time I clung to the word survivor because it felt like the only way to explain what I had been through.
It was a word that made people pause—maybe even listen.
But it never told the full story.
It didn’t speak to the layers—the contradictions, the tenderness beside the harm.
It didn’t hold the truth that many of us live:
That we are not only harmed, but also navigating the harm we’ve caused—and the harm we inherited.
That we are more than one moment, one relationship, or one label.
And I’m not alone.
We Can’t Heal What We Misname
When we talk about harm—especially in Black communities—we often use language that flattens people into roles.
We say “survivor.”
We say “harm-doer.”
We say these words as if we all agree on what they mean.
But most of us were never offered the time, the safety, or the space to fully explore the meanings behind them.
And labels—even the well-intended ones—can become containers.
They make us easier to categorize, but harder to truly see.
They often reduce a whole person down to what happened to them—or what they did—while erasing everything else.
Their story. Their love. Their pain. Their possibility.
What if we stopped using language as the limit?
What if we used it as the doorway?
When Systems Distract Us from the Root
Let’s be clear: our communities have always known what harm is.
We’ve carried that wisdom in our bodies, in our families, in our collective memory.
But what systems do is distort our understanding.
They isolate harm. They individualize it.
They teach us that the threat is our neighbor. Our partner. Our community. Not the systems that created the conditions for harm. Not the systems that withhold safety, then punish us for the ways we try to survive.
So we turn toward each other—sometimes with blame, sometimes with fear—
Instead of turning toward the root.
And when we adopt labels like “harm-doer” or “survivor” without pause,
We risk reinforcing the very separation those systems rely on.
We start to take on identities that were never ours to begin with.
We wear words shaped by systems that never had our wholeness in mind.
We begin to participate in the very harm we’ve inherited—becoming complicit in narratives that dehumanize us.
We are not meant to carry this many layers of grief.
We are not meant to inherit generations of pain—
And be expected to keep moving without time to breathe,
To grieve,
To ask why this is happening at all.
But that’s what systems do.
They don’t just harm us—
They rush us through the aftermath.
Before we can even name the pain,
They separate us from everything we love.
From our people.
From our sense of self.
From the clarity that could help us heal.
They isolate us—quickly, quietly, violently.
So the harm feels like ours alone.
So we forget to ask: Where did this begin?
Who benefits from my disconnection?
But we are not meant to be severed from what makes us whole.
We are not meant to be pulled apart before we even know we’re breaking.
We are meant to pause.
To reclaim our rhythm.
To remember that we are love—
Even when the world tries to bury it.
We are not meant to become permanent survivors or permanent harm-doers.
We are not defined by what hurt us, or what we did to survive it.
We are meant to thrive.
Together—or on our own—but always whole.
Systemic Violence Is the Water We Swim In
Systemic violence isn’t the exception—it’s the environment.
It’s the water we swim in, often without knowing we’re drenched in it.
When people are denied access to housing, healthcare, education, safety, nourishment, and self-worth—
When generations are told they are unlovable, unteachable, disposable—
What happens in the home is not disconnected from that.
It’s born of it.
Harm doesn’t begin with two people in a relationship.
It begins in systems that isolate, dehumanize, and disempower entire communities.
Systems that buried our softness and distorted our understanding of what love could hold.
That taught us to equate endurance with connection.
That convinced us that if love came with struggle, it was normal—and if it didn’t, it wasn’t real.
And when we only look at harm through the lens of individual blame,
We lose sight of the bigger picture—and the bigger possibility.
What If We Reimagined Healing?
Not as a binary of “survivor” and “harm-doer.”
Not as a checklist for who deserves grace and who doesn’t.
But as a collective remembering.
A remembering that many of us have caused harm—
Because we’ve been navigating systems that never taught us how to love, how to grieve,
How to be soft with ourselves or one another.
Because survival doesn’t always leave room for tenderness.
That doesn’t excuse harm.
But it does expand how we understand it—and how we heal from it.
We Are Our Own Resource
We are not only capable of understanding harm—we always have been.
Long before systems claimed expertise over our pain, we were already practicing safety, building care, and holding each other through it.
It was never that we didn’t know how.
It was that they didn’t want us to remember.
Systems work hard to convince us that we cannot heal without them.
That we need surveillance to feel safe.
That we need punishment to feel justice.
That we are not capable of protecting each other without their control.
But that’s a lie designed to disconnect us from our power.
We are our own resource. We always have been.
Our communities have the wisdom.
We have the capacity.
We have the vision.
We do not need to be policed or corrected into wholeness.
We need space to lead ourselves—on our terms, with our love, and in our rhythm.
Because survival is not the end goal.
Liberation is.
No More Perfect Survivors. No More Disposable People.
The current framework rewards those who survive in ways that are palatable.
Quiet. Respectable. Marketable.
But healing isn’t linear.
It’s messy.
It’s deeply human.
And when we center only one kind of survivor, we miss the whole point:
That we all deserve healing.
Even those who have harmed.
Even those who are still learning.
Even those who’ve never been given the tools to name what they carry.
From Punishment to Possibility
When we misname harm, we misdirect the healing.
And we risk building solutions that mirror the very systems that broke us.
We don’t need more judgment.
We need more reflection.
More room to ask:
What happened to this person before they ever hurt someone else?
What safety was missing?
What love was denied?
What might they have become if someone told them, early on, that they mattered?
This Is Bigger Than One Story
This isn’t about excusing harm.
It’s about understanding it—so we can transform it.
It’s about naming the root—systemic violence—so we can finally stop trying to heal the branches.
It’s about creating spaces where no one is discarded,
And where love becomes something we practice, not just promise.
To My Community—Especially Black Survivors
We are not broken.
We are not to blame for the harm we’ve endured—
Nor are we defined by the harm we’ve caused while trying to survive.
We are worthy.
We are needed.
We are remembering who we are.
And when we center healing over punishment,
When we choose care over control—
We don’t just survive.
We rise.
Let’s Talk
What would it look like to heal without shame?
To hold space for both accountability and grace?
To stop asking “what’s wrong with you?”
And start asking, “what happened to all of us?”
Share your thoughts.
Let’s reimagine together.
With love and honor,
Chriseithia
Founder of Black Self Wellth
Affirmation
I am more than what hurt me.
I am more than what I did to survive.
I am whole.
I am healing.
I am here.
#BlackSelfWellth #AllahMadeMeBlack #BeyondSurvival #CollectiveHealing #RadicalNurturing #BlackFutures #ReclaimYourNarrative #SelfLoveAsLiberation #SystemicViolence #CommunityCare #TransformativeJustice
This is sacred work, not open source.
Please honor the heart behind these words.
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