Resilience and sustainability have received attention in academic literature and development agendas as effective approaches to climate and environmental risk reductions. The interpretation and conceptualization of resilience and sustainability have been from the perspectives of practitioners, experts, and scholars. Hence, there is a limited understanding of how local communities perceive and experience these concepts in their lives. To address this problem, we conducted in-depth interviews with residents living in the informal communities of Old Fadama and Nima in Accra, Ghana. Informal settlements are extremely vulnerable to climate and environmental hazards due to issues such as poor urban planning, housing insecurity, and inadequate access to social services and infrastructure. The data analysis pointed to three main findings: 1) frameworks of analysis did not fully capture local understanding of resilience and sustainability, 2) resilience and sustainability goes beyond surviving hazards, and 3) the need to reimagine resilience and sustainability based on the lived experience of people. The findings underscore the importance of acknowledging that residents of informal settlements have different realities shaped by their experiences and risk perceptions. While such perceptions may not align with institutional approaches towards urban development, it underscores the need to involve local communities in decision-making processes towards resilience and sustainability building as advanced by the Sustainable Development Goals.