Sometimes life doesn’t say you’re ready.
It punches you.
I didn’t talk about this in the video.
What shook me most wasn’t the hit.
It was realizing that a younger version of me
would have crumbled
not from the force,
but from the idea
that I was vulnerable, exposed,
too soft to step forward,
too delicate to be seen.
For years,
I worked on showing up,
on letting myself be visible,
on not shrinking from the edges of life.
Somewhere inside, I kept hearing a voice
A phrase from a dream.
Eat, petite. Take up space. Don’t flinch. Don’t vanish.
And this random, violent, absurd street contact
proved something I didn’t know I’d earned.
I’m no longer the version of me
who doubts she can survive
the collision between intention and chaos, or as the French say,
Se cogner à la vie. Bumping hard into life itself, bruising and belonging all at once.
I took the hit.
I kept walking.
Not because I’m cold.
Not because I’m hardened.
But because, finally,
I trust my own resilience.
The punch wasn’t the test.
The punch was the answer.
