TL;DR
Turning 50 has me thinking differently about what deserves my energy. I still believe in communication, accountability, repair, and self-advocacy. I also know there is a point when repeatedly explaining what you need becomes another burden you are carrying.
Strength is not an obligation to endure.
Capacity is not consent.
Sometimes the question is no longer, “Can I make this work?” The question is, “Is making this work worthy of the life I have left?”
I am about to turn 50, and I have been thinking a lot about time.
Not productivity.
Not bucket lists.
Not whether I have accomplished enough by some arbitrary milestone.
I have been thinking about what deserves the years I have left.
More specifically, I have been thinking about what does not.
There are things I simply do not have time for anymore.
I do not have time to repeatedly explain why something hurts.
I do not have time to convince people that what I bring has value.
I do not have time to fight for space I was invited into.
I do not have time to keep negotiating for the authority required to carry responsibilities someone already gave me.
I do not have time to translate myself over and over until someone finally decides my needs are reasonable enough to honor.
That does not mean I expect people to read my mind.
Relationships require communication. Work requires communication. Leadership requires communication. People will misunderstand each other. Expectations need clarification. Sometimes we have to say what we need plainly because the other person genuinely does not know.
I understand all of that.
What I no longer have the capacity for is the endless explaining that comes after the explaining.
The second conversation.
The fourth clarification.
The gentle reminder.
The follow-up to the follow-up.
The conversation where I carefully remove every trace of frustration so someone can hear the message without becoming distracted by how I delivered it.
The meeting where I explain the same structural problem one more time, hoping I can finally find the collection of words that will make another person understand what I have been saying all along.
I have done a lot of that in my life.
Black women do a lot of that.
We learn early how to read rooms.
We anticipate needs.
We adjust our tone.
We calculate consequences.
We absorb dysfunction so everybody else can keep moving.
We fill gaps before anyone notices there was a gap.
We make the thing work.
Then, when the weight of making it work becomes too heavy, someone tells us we should have communicated our needs.
Sometimes we did.
They just did not require anything of anyone until we stopped carrying the weight.
That distinction matters.
I Have Absorbed Enough
There is a particular kind of tired that does not come from doing too much.
It comes from absorbing too much.
Absorbing confusion.
Absorbing inconsistency.
Absorbing someone else's lack of planning.
Absorbing the consequences of decisions you did not make.
Absorbing responsibilities without corresponding authority.
Absorbing disappointment while trying not to appear disappointed.
Absorbing disrespect while considering everybody else's intentions.
Absorbing your own anger long enough to determine whether expressing it will cost you more than swallowing it.
That kind of absorption has been normalized as strength for Black women.
She can handle it.
She will figure it out.
Ask her.
Give it to her.
She knows how to make it happen.
For years, I accepted some of that as evidence of my capacity.
I am capable.
I am resourceful.
I can see systems other people cannot see.
I can walk into chaos and find the thread.
I can help people make meaning out of mess.
Those things are true about me.
The mistake was believing that because I could carry something, I was supposed to.
Capacity is not consent.
Competence is not an unlimited resource.
Strength does not obligate me to remain in situations that continuously require it.
I understand that differently now.
There Comes a Point When Leaving Is Communication
I used to believe maturity meant staying at the table until everybody understood.
Talk it through.
Find the right words.
Give people an opportunity to respond.
Assume positive intent.
Seek understanding.
Those things still have value.
I also believe there are times when the most honest thing you can say is: This no longer works for me.
Not everything requires another summit meeting.
Not every relationship needs one final beautifully articulated explanation.
Not every workplace deserves another strategy for how it could treat you better.
Not every person needs an additional opportunity to understand something your experience has already taught you they are unwilling or unable to hold.
Sometimes leaving is not avoidance.
Sometimes leaving is the conclusion.
There is a difference between running away from discomfort and recognizing a pattern.
One difficult conversation is discomfort.
A repeated experience is data.
At some point, you have enough information.
The Cost of Constant Advocacy
We talk about self-advocacy as though it is free.
Speak up.
Ask for what you need.
Set the boundary.
Have the difficult conversation.
There is wisdom in all of that.
There is also a cost.
Advocacy requires energy.
You have to recognize what is happening.
Regulate your response.
Decide what you need.
Determine whether the environment is safe enough to say it.
Choose your words.
Consider the politics.
Anticipate the reaction.
Deliver the message.
Manage what happens afterward.
Then you still have to do your actual job.
At 25, maybe I had more appetite for that fight.
At 35, I may have believed proving myself would eventually create safety.
At 45, I started questioning why I was working so hard to earn conditions other people seemed to receive without negotiation.
At 50, I am asking a different question: Do I even want to spend my life force here?
That question changes everything.
It moves the decision from: Can I make this work? to: Is making this work worthy of me?
I Am No Longer Auditioning for Peace
Peace used to feel like something I could have once everything was handled.
Once the project was finished.
Once the conflict was resolved.
Once they understood.
Once I had enough money.
Once the house was clean.
Once everyone around me was okay.
Then I could rest.
I do not believe that anymore.
Peace cannot always be the reward waiting at the end of endurance.
Sometimes peace has to become part of the criteria.
Does this relationship allow me to remain connected to myself?
Does this work require me to abandon myself to succeed?
Am I constantly dysregulated because I am in the wrong environment, or am I simply uncomfortable because growth is asking something of me?
Am I communicating a need for the first time, or am I pleading for recognition of something I have already made clear?
Am I solving a problem, or have I become responsible for compensating for someone else's unwillingness to solve it?
Those are different questions than the ones I asked when I was younger.
Age has not made me less willing to work.
It has made me more discerning about what work I am willing to do.
What I Have Time For Now
I have time for reciprocity.
I have time for people who can hear a need without requiring a dissertation.
I have time for relationships where accountability does not always require confrontation.
I have time for work where responsibility and authority live in the same neighborhood.
I have time for collaboration that does not require me to constantly prove why collaboration matters.
I have time for people who notice.
People who ask.
People who repair.
People who can receive feedback without turning my experience into a debate.
People who understand that my strength is something to respect, not something to exploit.
I have time for joy that does not have to be earned.
I have time for curiosity.
I have time for meaningful work.
I have time for people and places where my nervous system does not have to remain on assignment.
I have time for the life I am still becoming.
I simply have less time for everything that keeps requiring me to disappear in order to maintain it.
That may be one of the gifts of turning 50.
Time becomes less theoretical.
You start understanding that every yes is made of minutes you will never get back.
Every argument costs something.
Every fight consumes something.
Every season of enduring is still a season of your life.
So I am becoming more careful with mine.
Not harder.
Not colder.
Not unwilling to communicate.
Just less willing to spend precious years repeatedly explaining why I deserve conditions that allow me to be whole.
Some things are worth fighting for.
Some things are worth repairing.
Some things deserve another conversation.
Some things deserve grace, and some things have already taken enough.
I am learning the difference.
The question is, “Is making this work worthy of the life I have left?”
What’s in the Pot?
Where are you communicating a need for the first time, and where have you been explaining the same need repeatedly?
What are you carrying simply because you are capable of carrying it?
What relationships, roles or responsibilities require so much advocacy that maintaining them has become another job?
What would change if peace became part of your decision-making criteria instead of the reward you receive after everything else is handled?
What has already taken enough?