When I was a teenager, I loved Ralph Waldo Emerson, particularly his essay on self-reliance. Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind. I repeated these words to myself often. Back then my family was large and everyone knew everyone’s business. This was by design. As somewhat recent immigrants, we had learned how to keep our family safe. My mom and aunties would often prod me on the details of my life, cross-referencing information, verifying. I kept several diaries at that time, some of them in code, because I knew that if my diary was discovered it was getting read. Probably by more than one person.

All of this was done for your own good, they liked to tell me, because they loved me. And I felt loved. I also felt stifled. I planned my escape to a mythical land of self-reliance, where one day I could do for myself alone and not worry what anyone else thought. Think Henry David Thoreau, but Doc Marten boots, drug addiction, and a basement apartment in downtown Seattle.

My journey of rebellious self-reliance indeed led me to some mythical places, but they were scary, too. And self-destructive. It took many years of sobriety for me to finally appreciate my family. During some of the worst days of my addiction, those same aunties helped my mom pull me out of drug dens and bring me home. These are the kind of aunties who will drop everything when called, pick you up from anywhere you ask, and bring along a plate of salami and bread in case you’re hungry. They arrive early to help and stay late to clean up and they never ask for anything in return. They know how to care for you because they know you. They take the time to get up in your business and ask.

The aunties know that Emerson’s idea of self-reliance is a white supremacist lie. And it is always, ultimately, self-destructive. None of us, no matter who we are, relies on ourselves alone. Not even Thoreau, who was famously cared for by his aunties, too. The aunties have always known. We are all inherently interdependent, meaning mutually dependent, dependent on one another to survive. Without community care—without a multitude of generations leaning into that interdependence and making use of it—none of us will make it. The earth and its creatures can live no other way.

Emerson was wrong. It isn’t self-reliance that secures the integrity of my mind, but self-care. And even that doesn’t secure the integrity of my soul. For the integrity of my soul, I look to my community: my family, my ancestors, the earth, all the communities of people who claim me, and my body, as I claim myself. For the integrity of my soul, I build resilience by building relationships. I follow the example of my aunties, asking for help when I need it and showing up for others when they need me. Interdependence means we rely on one another. We depend upon each other. We actively care. It is the very opposite of self-reliance. And in this time of global pandemic and social revolution, it is the only way we will survive.