I'm a Recovering Blame-Shifter!

“The past can hurt. But the way I see it, you can either run from it or learn from it.” 

-Rafiki

I used to point fingers at everything and everyone.
And when I say everything—I mean everything.

My mom? Too hard on me.
My dad? Absent.
My teachers? Didn’t care enough.
The world? Unfair.
And if we’re being honest... I didn’t even ask to be here, so how could any of this possibly be my fault?

That was my mindset for a long time. Until I realized:
Blaming everything around me wasn’t changing anything about me.

The Spoon You’re Given

Everyone doesn’t start off with a silver spoon. Some of us were handed plastic ones... or none at all. Some of us were handed pain, silence, trauma, or responsibility way too early. We were told to be strong, to keep quiet, to “deal with it.”

But here’s where the shift happens:

Once you realize what you were handed, it’s on you to decide what you’ll do with it.

And yeah, maybe your past is heavy. Maybe you’ve been through some things that tried to break you.
Maybe your story includes abandonment, abuse, poverty, suicide attempts, teen pregnancy, dropping out, or just plain feeling lost.

But I ask myself this question all the time:

"Is that it? Is that all I want my story to be?"

When people ask about my life—do I want to stop at the hard parts?
Or do I want to tell them how I rose from it?
How I’m rising from it?

The People Who Inspired My Shift

I started listening to stories of people who were just like me—who came from the bottom and built something bigger:

Barack Obama.
Tupac.
Jill Scott.
Oprah.
Jay-Z.
Will Smith.
Jim Carrey.
Tyler Perry.

People who were laughed at. Counted out. Ignored. Dismissed.
And still found a way to become them. The versions of themselves they were always meant to be.

They helped me stop obsessing over what was, and start focusing on what could be—if I let go of the blame, owned my story, and kept going.

My Truth Today

I’m not where I want to be yet.

I have dreams so big they scare me.
But I’ve also got something powerful: perspective.

And I know that if I hadn’t made the decision to stop blaming and start building, I’d still be sitting on the sidelines—mad, bitter, stuck—watching everyone else build lives they were bold enough to believe in.

Now I’m here. Still healing. Still growing. Still trying.
But I’ve learned to use what hurt me as fuel.
To turn my “why me?” into “watch me.”

So What Now?

I don’t want to be a lesser version of myself just to make others comfortable.
I don’t want to dim my light so someone else doesn’t feel overshadowed.
I don’t want to play small because I was told to shrink.

I want to own my story. All of it.

Because it’s not about how I started.
It’s about how I finish.

It’s not about the hand you were dealt.
It’s how you play the game.

And I’m finally ready to play—for real this time.