When You’re Surviving, You Can’t Dream

There’s a version of me I barely recognize now. She lived in survival mode. Not because she wanted to—but because she had to.

Every day was about getting through. getting through the pain. getting through the appointments, getting through the silence of being forgotten, getting through the weight of a life that didn’t look like the one she imagined.

And when you’re surviving, you don’t dream, you don’t make vision boards, you don’t manifest your best life, you don’t sit around journaling about goals, you focus on one thing: don’t fall apart today.

No one talks about that part of healing. The part where you’re technically “alive” but feel nowhere near living. Where the future feels blurry and distant, and the only thing that matters is making it through the next hour without crying in public.

People love to say “you’re so strong.” but survival doesn’t feel strong. It feels like clawing your way through the dark with no map and no guarantee that the light exists, it feels like holding your breath for months at a time; it feels like envy when you see people laugh without flinching, like grief for a version of yourself you buried quietly just to keep going.

I spent a long time in that space. too long, maybe; but I want to tell you this— eventually, surviving ends and something else begins.

At first, it’s small; you laugh without guilt, you exhale without fear, you let someone hold your gaze just a little longer, you take a walk not because you have to, but because you want to.

And then one day, you dream again. Not of the past—but of the future. You start asking “what if” with hope, not dread. You start picturing a life that fits who you are now,

not who you used to be.

Dreaming again doesn’t mean you’re healed; it means you’ve made it to the other side of the fire and realized you’re still standing. Different, yes; but still worthy, still magical, still capable of more.

So if you’re in the thick of survival right now, please hear me—you’re not broken, you’re not failing, you’re not behind.

You’re surviving: and that’s brave as hell.

But when you’re ready, when your breath slows and your chest softens— dream.

Even if it scares you, especially if it scares you.

That’s when life begins again.

And you deserve every moment of it.

When You’re Surviving, You Can’t Dream

By Sneakers and Stilettos

When you’re surviving, you don’t look at the stars—

you scan the ground for cracks for danger for a way out.

You don’t plan five years ahead, you plan five minutes.

Next breath, next step, next time you can sit down without breaking.

Dreams are a luxury.

Hope feels reckless.

Joy feels foreign.

When you’re surviving, you shrink.

Your world narrows to the sharp edges of pain, to the checklist of staying alive.

Eat. Move. Pretend.

Repeat.

People say,

“Visualize your future.”

But how can you, when your eyes are blurry with exhaustion,

And your future is fogged with fear?

But— one day, the ground steadies.

Your shoulders drop.

The weight lifts, if only for a moment.

And in that moment, you see it: a flicker.

A glimpse of something soft, something beautiful, something more.

Not survival --  but life.

Not just existing  -- but dreaming.

And that— that’s when the healing begins.