She sat beside me on the cold metal bus bench like a soft prophecy wrapped in wrinkles and wisdom, an old Black lady with a quiet elegance that didn’t ask to be noticed. She stared at her bare wedding finger the way someone studies a scar they’ve forgiven, then smiled, “It took me a while, but I did it. Don’t you ever let a man hold you back,” she said, adjusting the purse strap on her shoulder as if punctuating the lesson. I nodded, young enough to agree but too emotionally fragile to understand. “The moment I chose myself, my world didn’t end, it finally began,” she added, her voice steady as truth that doesn’t need proof. It would take me fourteen years to fully grasp what she’d handed me on that bench. Her wisdom wasn’t only about loving others, but about the quiet, daily decision to stop abandoning yourself.
Fall 2024 is the season my mind, heart, and soul aligned. The overdue decision to stop shrinking creatively didn’t arrive with fireworks or applause. Instead, it came quietly, like a truth tapping on my ribs from the inside, tired of being ignored. Looking back, I could see I had been shrinking my whole life; folding myself smaller, dimming my language, softening my opinions, because I learned early that being too much in a Black family meant being labeled a problem. I was the black sheep with a loud mouth and a tender heart, the one who questioned why pain was passed down like an heirloom and called “old school upbringing” instead of what it was: abuse dressed up as tradition. I advocated for children when adults told me to mind my place. I named generational trauma when everyone else called it respect. And for that, I was punished, dismissed, and misunderstood.
So I learned to hide. Not entirely, because real gifts don’t disappear; they float just enough to survive. I let my creativity peek out only when it burned too badly to keep inside me. Poetry spilled out in competitions I’d downplay later. Novels were written quietly, tucked away like secrets. Paintings sold for little to nothing, not because they lacked value, but because I didn’t yet understand my own. I collected awards and achievements and talked about them as if they were accidents, as if they happened to someone else. The light in me was never celebrated; it was overshadowed by adults reacting to the discomfort of being confronted by a child they had hurt. I became “disrespectful,” “too sensitive,” “dramatic”; a problem child who just happened to write dope poetry, paint cool pictures, and spit spoken word that made rooms go silent.
Growing up on the West Side of Chicago, being artistic didn’t earn you cool points. Especially not if you wore Chuck Taylors instead of Jordans, chose notebooks over boys, metaphors over drugs. That’s why I knew early on that I wanted to make a living from my gifts, the way athletes, actors, and musicians do. I wanted creativity to pay my bills, to keep my lights on, to feed me. But wanting and believing are two different things. And I didn’t believe in myself enough. Not yet.
I chose safety, or what I thought was safety, when I became an early childhood educator—work I love deeply. Still, surviving on that salary in Chicago, even with a Master’s Degree, feels like holding my breath indefinitely. I stayed, always hunting for second incomes, odd jobs, side hustles that drained me more than teaching ever could. Then one night, exhausted and stressed, lying in bed because my dreams were bigger than my bank account, I opened TikTok—not looking for motivation, just trying to escape my thoughts. And there they were—creatives. Writers. Artists. Designers. People making money from their creations. Happily. Not barely surviving. Not apologizing. Happily.
That’s when the switch flipped.
I was done being a product of my environment. Done letting my zip code, my upbringing, and my trauma decide how far I was allowed to go. Done shrinking my dreams so other people wouldn’t feel threatened by my ambition. I realized something radical: I already had everything I needed. The brains. The discipline. The creativity. The hunger. What I lacked wasn’t resources; it was permission. And I finally gave it to myself.
Now I’m launching an online store, Creative Assortments, in the spring of this year, which will showcase my creativity to its fullest. From original art pieces to soulmate journals, every colorful idea I’ve had will be available for the world to see.
Running head-on into your dreams costs you things. It costs you comfort. It costs you familiarity. It costs you conversations, because you can’t discuss your moves with everyone, only your growth. People will find ways to hold you down, often unintentionally, by projecting their fears onto your courage. Loneliness is the toll for choosing yourself in a world that benefits from you staying small. But what this season gave me was confidence. Confidence to use what I have to get everything I’ve ever wanted, which gave me something else unfamiliar—hope. Real hope. The kind I’d lacked my whole life as a survivor of child abuse. Hope that says my story doesn’t end where it began. Hope that says my gifts were never accidental.
My creativity isn’t extra. It’s essential. And I refuse to spend another season apologizing for the very thing that saved me.
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