Ten degrees from Boyd Hill
On launch night I stopped and pointed at who was standing up front with me. Where you came from is not the sentence you have to live.
On October 3rd we opened A Better Me the way I wanted to open it: in a room, not a link. More than thirty people filled IAM Studios in Rock Hill and walked the six systems with me.
And at one point in the night, I stopped and pointed at who was standing up front.
“Between the three people you see standing right here, from Boyd Hill Projects… you got ten degrees of people that grew up in the projects. So your situation don't have to define who you are.”Launch night, Walk the Six · October 3, 2026
Ten degrees. From the projects.
I said it because I needed everybody in that room to see it with their own eyes, not hear it as a slogan.
Where I came from
I spent seven steady years at my grandmother's table. Then we moved to Boyd Hill. And in Boyd Hill, fitting in sometimes meant making the wrong choices.
When you grow up somewhere people have already decided about, you inherit a sentence before you're old enough to argue with it. It sounds like: “I am the product of where I've been.” Nobody has to say it to you. The environment says it for them.
But that night, I wasn't up front by myself.
“This was the first person I met when I moved to Boyd Hill Projects… I was at 240 Fargo, he was at 272. That's how close we are. This is our circle, this is who we are.”
240 and 272. Same street. Same projects. Same sentence handed to both of us. And neither one of us let it be the last word.
Your situation don't have to define who you are.
The circle that raised you
System 03 is Choose Your Circle. And people misuse it. They hear “choose your circle” and think it means cut everybody off, outgrow your friends, and let them know it.
That's not it. The people who loved you at your lowest are not obstacles. They're roots.
The circle you came up with can do something nobody else can do for you. They can prove that the place didn't get the final say. When somebody who stood on the same street as you becomes something the street said they couldn't, that's not just their win. That's evidence. And evidence is what breaks an old sentence.
Here's what I said to one of them that night, in front of everybody:
“You don't know the inspiration that you gave to all the other kids… that started to believe that we weren't defined by the environment that we grew up in.”
I think about that a lot. Most people who go first never find out what it did for the ones behind them. They were just trying to make it out. They had no idea anybody was watching.
Somebody went first. Somebody always does. And the kids watching from the next building over started to believe it was possible because they could see it.
Addition, not amputation
So here's the move this week. Not cutting. Adding.
Look at the five people you actually spend your time with. Ask one question next to each name: does this relationship pull me toward where I was, or toward where I'm going? If your circle has nobody whose world is bigger than yours, add one. Nobody who's survived what you're facing, add one.
And then do the thing most of us never do. Go back to the people who already went first for you, and tell them.
Your situation is where you started. It is not who you are. Change the sentence, and pick a circle that won't let you go back to the old one.