THE SOFT IS WHAT SURVIVES


©2025 Samantha Syrnich — All Rights Reserved

I used to think survival meant armor—
hard edges,
shut doors,
a face the world couldn’t bruise.

But life has taught me differently.
It wasn’t the hard parts of me that made it through
the storms,
the betrayals,
the nights that tried to unmake me.

No—
it was the soft things.
The quiet voice in my chest whispering, keep going.
The tenderness I refused to abandon
even when the world mistook it for weakness.
The way I still believed in goodness
after watching so much fall apart.

The soft is what remembered hope,
what held onto truth,
what loved without apology.
It was my softness that lifted me
when strength alone could not.

Because softness is not fragile—
it is faithful.
It bends but does not break.
It feels deeply,
sees clearly,
and still chooses the light.

So now I stand,
not hardened by what I’ve endured,
but refined—
a woman who knows to her core
that the gentlest parts of her
are the ones that survived
everything.

— Samantha Syrnich