We’ve been taught to make do. To stretch. To survive. And for generations, Black women—especially Millennials, Gen X, and Boomers—have done just that. We turned scarcity into creativity. We learned to take the cards we were dealt and not ask for more. Some of us call it humility. Others call it strength. But if we’re honest, it’s been something else: conditioning.
I was talking with a Gen X woman I’m close to not long ago. She’d been promoted at work months earlier, but she paused when I asked how she was shaping the role to reflect what she wanted. “I haven’t really asked for anything,” she said. “I’ve just been trying to do a good job.” I knew what she meant precisely. I’ve done the same—grateful just to be there, afraid to be seen as ungrateful if I asked for more.
Many of our mothers are the same way. Raised in a time when keeping the peace was prized above all else, they learned to avoid conflict, especially in relationships. What we often acknowledge as strength in Black women is sometimes just another word for silence.
This kind of emotional inheritance isn’t just about personality but survival. The concept of “weathering,” developed by public health researcher Arline Geronimus, ScD, explains how the chronic stress of racism, sexism, and systemic inequality leads to early health deterioration in Black women. In other words, this constant stretching—physically, emotionally, mentally—has a cost. And that cost is often paid by our bodies.
It shows up in disproportionately high rates of hypertension, maternal mortality, autoimmune disorders, and cardiovascular disease among Black women. It shows up in quiet ways, too—in the tension we hold in our jaws, in the dreams we defer, in the way we downplay our pain at doctor’s appointments or apologize for having needs at all. When said and done, it ultimately shows up in how we love and care for ourselves–through the lens of believing we’re not enough or don’t fully deserve it.
When you’re taught not to ask for much, you don’t just settle—you shrink. And shrinking becomes so second nature that you forget what expansion even feels like. We start to silence our opinions before they’re fully formed. We take the corner office but hesitate to decorate it. We become experts at anticipating everyone else’s needs while struggling to name our own. Shrinking changes how we move and shapes how we see ourselves and others.
But something is shifting.
Younger generations—Gen Z and Gen Alpha—are moving differently. They were raised on access, information, and self-expression. They are fluent in boundary-setting and unafraid to advocate for themselves. According to the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Gen Z is more likely to challenge authority, demand inclusivity, and prioritize mental health. They’re growing up with platforms and language many of us didn’t have. While we were taught to “be grateful,” they’re being taught to “stand up for yourself.” To many of us, their energy feels disruptive. Sometimes even disrespectful. But if we step back, we might see it as liberating.
Because what they’re doing—what we weren’t allowed to do—is ask for more without guilt. More care. More rest. More pay. More room. They are unlearning what we’re only just beginning to name in real-time. And while their boldness can feel uncomfortable to witness, it’s also an invitation for us to reimagine what strength looks like. For us to learn how to stop apologizing for our desires. Maybe strength isn’t self-sacrifice or always holding it together. Maybe it looks like softness, asking for help, or resting without apology. Maybe it’s naming what we need before we’re on empty.
This shift isn’t easy. Asking for more after decades of asking for less feels clunky, vulnerable, and even shameful. Sometimes, we overcompensate and come in swinging. Other times, we back down before we even start. But we’re practicing. We’re learning to stop calling crumbs a meal.
This change is happening quietly, collectively. I hear it in group chats and therapy sessions. I feel it in conversations with friends tired of performing gratitude for things they’ve earned. It’s not just one woman’s revelation. It’s a generational reckoning.
We are the bridge generation. Those in our 30s, 40s, and 50s—raised by women who made do and now raise or mentor girls who expect more—stand in the tension of two realities. But tension is how transformation begins.
We still have time to ask. To expect. To expand.
There’s quiet strength in learning to desire again. It’s not just for ourselves but for the women who follow us and for those who never had the opportunity or permission. Because not asking for much hasn’t protected us. It’s only kept us from becoming everything we are meant to be.
