Growing up, many of us are taught to place limits on what we can accomplish while on earth. We tend to think of things in binary form: either as possible or, more frequently, impossible.

When you're in survival mode, you numb yourself.

No matter what is happening in your life, you always offer tea.

One of my fondest memories growing up in Rwanda was seeing everyone participating in community-building activities. This happened every Saturday at the end of month. People work together in cleaning streets, planting trees, and take care of each other by facilitating productive conversations and actions that are beneficial for the society.

It occurred to me that memorials shouldn't be grand. If you really want to honor the memory of a tragedy, you shouldn't create areas of calm reflection. You should make people uncomfortable. Put them in the shoes of those who perpetrated and those who suffered. Then ask, would they be able to forgive in these situations?

As a child growing up in refugee camps, life taught me that many things were impossible. My older sister, Claire, taught me otherwise when her strength and resilience made the impossible possible in the way she worked, behaved, and took control of our lives.

There are millions of people, refugees, who have experienced the same conflicts and struggles I did. They have the same potential to defy the odds and achieve great things.

Sharing presumes and creates equality.

I'm still coping with my trauma, but coping by trying to find different ways to heal it rather than hide it.