Arrogance over Empathy

 "The most dangerous people are often the ones who have never been dragged to the edges of themselves and forced to live there. They move through the world with clean hands and steady voices, believing that a life unshaken by deep pain is the natural standard, and anything else is a personal failure. They talk about healing as if it is a simple decision, like changing a shirt or taking a different street home. They stand on solid ground and look down at those clinging to the ledge, and instead of reaching out, they question why anyone is still hanging there. They mistake their comfort for wisdom, their luck for strength, and their lack of wounds for proof that others are weak.

These are the ones who say “just get over it” because they have never had to sit awake all night, arguing with their own thoughts just to stay alive until morning. They have never felt the way a memory can choke you harder than hands ever could. They have not known what it is to feel your heart race at the sound of footsteps, or a door closing, or a voice that sounds like someone who once hurt you. To them, the mind is a quiet room that always obeys. They cannot understand what it means to be trapped inside yourself, replaying scenes you never asked to watch, begging your body to calm down while it shakes without your permission. So they call it overreacting, they call it negativity, they call it drama, because they have never had to crawl out of an invisible prison one breath at a time.

They laugh at the word “triggered” as if it is a joke instead of a hidden wound being ripped open again and again by things no one else even notices. They roll their eyes at panic attacks because they have never felt their heart slam so hard they thought it might stop, or their chest tighten until the air turned to stone. They think trauma is a story with a clear beginning and a clear end, some terrible thing that happened a long time ago and is now neatly filed away. They cannot grasp that for some people, the “after” is just as brutal as the event itself. The body remembers what the mind tries to bury. The danger is not just their ignorance, but the confidence with which they offer advice about battles they have never had to fight.

These are the people who look at someone still struggling to stand and say, “But it’s been years,” as if time alone is medicine. They do not see how old wounds can bleed through the strongest smile. They do not know that a person can go to work, pay their bills, crack jokes, and still wake up every day feeling like a part of them never left the moment everything went wrong. They judge what they can see and dismiss what they cannot. When someone cries “too much,” they call it attention-seeking. When someone goes quiet, they call it cold. They do not understand that both can be desperate forms of survival. They see only the behavior and never the bruise beneath it.

They confuse survival with drama because they have never had to build a life on top of something that shattered them. They see a woman who double-checks every lock and think she is paranoid, not realizing she is trying to feel safe in a world that taught her she is not. They see someone who pulls away from touch and assume they are cold-hearted, not knowing that touch once meant danger. They see someone who struggles to trust and call them difficult, never understanding that trust, for some, has been used like a weapon. They do not know what it is like to be betrayed by someone who said “I love you,” to be hurt by someone who should have protected you, to be silenced when you finally found the courage to speak. And because they do not know, they decide it is easier to pretend the hurt is exaggerated than to admit the world is far crueler than they wanted to believe.

The terrifying part is not only that they misunderstand, but that they often do not want to understand. To truly listen would mean facing the fact that the world is not as safe as they feel. It would mean admitting that the comfort they live in is not guaranteed, that their peace is not proof of fairness, only of fortune. It would mean accepting that people they admire, systems they trust, and families they defend are capable of deep harm. It is easier to believe the survivor is too sensitive than to accept that cruelty sits closer than they think. It is easier to say “you’re overthinking” than to ask, “What happened to you?” and then hold the answer with care.

So they turn their faces away from the rawness in other people’s stories. They dismiss the shaking voice, the restless hands, the crowded silence between sentences. They offer shallow phrases: “Everything happens for a reason,” “Others have it worse,” “You just need to think positive.” These words sound kind on the surface, but underneath they carry something sharp: the message that if you cannot simply choose to feel better, you must be the problem. They turn suffering into a test you are failing. They turn trauma into a choice you are not strong enough to undo. And in doing so, they cut survivors twice—once with what was done to them, and again with the judgment that follows.

The truth is, no one needs you to have lived their exact nightmare to show them respect. You do not have to know the burn of every fire to understand that fire hurts. You do not have to have cried their exact tears to understand that grief is heavy. What breaks hearts is not the lack of shared experience; it is the lack of effort to care. The most dangerous people are not simply unscarred; they are unwilling to open their eyes. They protect their comfort by denying another’s reality. They protect their innocence by calling another’s story an exaggeration. They would rather guard their sense of safety than admit that someone in front of them is carrying more than they can see.

If you have survived what others do not understand, your existence is not an exaggeration and your pain is not an inconvenience. You are not weak for still feeling what happened to you. You are not “too much” for breaking down on a day that looks ordinary to everyone else. You have faced things that would have crushed the people who now call you dramatic. You have walked through nights that would have stolen their light completely. The strength it takes to keep breathing in a life that sometimes feels unlivable is a strength most people will never be forced to find. Your scars do not make you less; they are proof that you refused to disappear.

And if you are one of the few who has not been torn open by deep trauma, that is a gift, not a qualification to judge. Your peace is not a prize you earned by being better; it is a tenderness life has allowed you to keep. Honor it by refusing to use it as a weapon against those who were not as lucky. Instead of saying “just move on,” try saying “I may not understand, but I believe you.” Instead of doubting someone’s reaction, consider that you cannot see the weight they carry. Let your lack of scars make you softer, not sharper. Let it teach you to listen more than you speak, to ask instead of assume, to comfort instead of correct.

In the end, the world does not need more people who stand at a distance and demand that pain be tidy. The world needs people who are brave enough to sit with what they cannot fix, to hear stories that unsettle them, to hold shaking hands without pulling away. The most dangerous people are those untouched by trauma who choose arrogance over empathy. The most healing people are those who, whether broken or unbroken, choose to let another person’s truth matter more than their own comfort. May you always be the latter. May you never turn away from a wounded heart just because it scares you. And if you carry wounds yourself, may you know this: you are not a burden for feeling deeply, you are not wrong for still hurting, and you deserved gentleness in every moment someone told you to “just get over it” instead of asking how they could help you carry what was never yours to bear alone."

~ SDG