What To Do With Your Inheritance

2 min

Tuesday night left me full.

I had the pleasure of attending an intimate conversation with Daria Burke—author, speaker, award-winning business leader, and wellbeing advocate. I read her memoir, Of My Own Making, last month—and I couldn’t put it down.

It’s the kind of book that stays with you. Raw, courageous, and deeply inspiring. Through personal storytelling and cutting-edge research, Daria explores how confronting childhood trauma not only shaped her career but also rewired her brain for growth.

As I sat in the audience that evening, one thing Daria said echoed in my mind:

We don’t get to decide our beginnings—but we do get to choose what we carry.

For many of us—especially Black women and women of color—our stories begin in places we wouldn’t have chosen: loss, migration, survival.

But the story we continue to write? That’s ours.

During the Q&A, I raised my hand.

I told Daria that for me, her book read like a meditation on inheritance—on the things passed down to us, spoken or unspoken, and how we decide what to carry forward.

I referenced a scene in the memoir where she takes her two young nieces—just two and four—to visit her mother, who had longed been debilitated by drug addiction. Things take a turn. And in a moment of fierce clarity and protection, she says:

“We’re leaving. I will never let you do to these girls what you did to me and Leah. And if I have my way, you’ll never see them again.”

That moment struck me.

It wasn’t just a boundary—it was a breaking point.

A refusal to repeat what no longer serves.

A choice to offer the next generation something different.

So I asked her: What do you hope your nieces and nephews inherit from you?

Daria paused. Smiled. And thanked me for the question.

Then she shared something that made the whole room go quiet.

Her nieces have read the book—multiple times since its release. It’s given them context. Clarity. A deeper understanding of her sister—their mother—and of themselves. It’s helped them extend grace to one another in ways they hadn’t been able to before.

And then she shared that she recently learned that her nieces and nephews—this new generation—have made a verbal pact. They’ve promised each other:

If any one of them strays from the path they’ve envisioned for themselves, the others will lovingly guide them back. They have each other’s back.

I could’ve cried right there.

It was a reminder that we all have agency—at any given moment—to choose how we move forward.

And that choice is what we make of the inheritance. It’s how we shape the kind of inheritance we pass on.

Today, I offer you this invitation to examine your own inheritance:

What have you inherited—stories, beliefs, ways of being?

Which ones are you choosing to keep?

Which ones are you ready to release?

Because sometimes, the most radical act is choosing again.

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