“The Weight Beneath the Mask: On Patience, Rage, and the Quiet War for Empathy”

Every morning, before the sun gets up and the world begins to call itself civilized again, I sit with myself. I try to be better than I was the day before. That’s the promise I’ve made, not to the world, but to the little boy I used to be—the one who deserved more tenderness than he received. The one who saw too much too early and still had the nerve to keep dreaming.

I learn patience.

I try to learn empathy.

And most days, it feels like trying to catch rain in a sieve.

Being a Foundational Black American in this country is to walk a tightrope stretched across a minefield. You must smile with your teeth clenched, laugh without humor, and nod when what you really want to do is roar.

I try to treat everyone equally.

That’s the goal, isn’t it? That’s the thing we’re taught to believe in. Equality. Fairness. The golden rule and the silver-tongued lies that follow it. But some days, it feels like I’m trying to hug a fist. Some days, the evidence of this country’s contempt for my existence is not anecdotal—it’s algorithmic. Baked into news cycles, comment sections, and the careful silence of the people who walk past injustice without blinking.

You hear it. You feel it.

There is discomfort in their voice when you speak with authority.

The glance at your hands when you’re simply reaching for your ID.

The way your masculinity is questioned when you don’t perform it on their terms, and criminalized when you do.

Empathy feels dangerous some days.

Softness feels like an invitation to be taken advantage of. And still, I reach for it. Not because I believe I’ll be met with it in return, but because I know what happens when you let anger do all the talking. You lose the part of yourself that still believes in healing.

But let me say this plainly, because it needs to be said:

Empathy is not weakness.

It is resistance in its most refined form. It is the choice to keep your humanity intact when the world insists on stripping it from you.

Still, I struggle.

I struggle not to let the bitterness set in.

I struggle to hold my tongue when my dignity is disregarded.

I struggle not to internalize the weight of microaggressions—those paper cuts that don’t bleed but never quite heal either.

And underneath it all is a rage most people don’t want to acknowledge.

Not because it isn’t real. But if they acknowledged it, they’d have to admit they helped cause it.

What would they think, these coworkers and strangers and casual acquaintances,

if they knew what it takes for me to walk through the world as calmly as I do?

What would they feel if they could feel the heat I have to suppress just to make them comfortable?

What if they knew that beneath this patience is a warrior holding his sword with the blade facing inward?

We are not angry without reason.

We are angry because we are still here, and still treated like ghosts.

We are angry because we know what our fathers swallowed.

Because we watched our mothers turn crumbs into miracles.

Because we are still expected to smile while being slowly erased.

And yet…

We rise early. We go to work. We raise children. We love.

We choose empathy when anger would be easier.

We wear the mask, not because we are afraid, but because we know the cost of taking it off.

Some mornings I fail.

I lose my temper. I withdraw. I despair.

But most mornings, I try again.

Because the work isn’t just surviving.

The work is staying human in a world that profits off your dehumanization.

And so, I practice patience.

Not because the world deserves it.

But because I do.

By Kyle Hayes

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