some chizuk…i hope

This is something i wrote to someone who sent me their life story. I hope it benefits some of you here who have had have difficult lives.

I could never think poorly of someone who has experienced what you have experienced; in fact, the very act of writing your response to me bespeaks a courage held by precious few. No one can ever nor have they the right to judge you for who or what you are. You are a walking, talking, breathing miracle by your very existence. It is an honour to know you.

I cried many times before I was able to put my story to paper for the world to see, and I would cry many times more if only I still could. Reading your account, I felt such a great surge of empathy which almost brought me to tears. I say almost because, as much as i desperately wanted to cry while reading your story, my life has robbed me of the gift and ability. I envy you your ability to cry, circumstance aside. I can only wish you a life where crying is no longer necessary.

I am deeply grateful for your opening up to me, and i understand how difficult it must have been to you. It was difficult for me too just a scant six months ago. You being able to tell me and anyone else your story at once validates and encourages my mission, my purpose. We have been given our lives for a reason, and whatever that reason is, it is for us, collectively, to try and help others through their plight. It is a path i have chosen for myself and there is no greater pleasure for me in this world than the joy of seeing someone transcend the hardships of their life. Obviously you have not gotten over your past and neither have i mine, but you’re fighting and that is everything. Your life is not defined by your past. You are not defined by your past. Your past is of you, it is not YOU. Again, I salute your courage.

Our lives havethus far been quite similar, and I am glad that you are making one for and by yourself; best of luck and only the best 🙂 I wish you only happiness and success 🙂

I’m rambling…but for me…this is my purpose, my raison d’etre – my noble cause. It seems dramatic, and perhaps it is, but after getting the feedback I did from other articles I’ve written on the subject, seeing people who for YEARS lived in fear of their own shadow and the specter of stigma and public opinion, finally coming out of the attic (a term I use because mentally ill children and family members were typically hidden away from society by their families, often in the attic) was so cathartic for those telling their stories, almost like an overpressurized steam pipe finally getting the relief it seeks, that I knew I had to do more. I had to enable others to tell their stories, to tell the world their stories, so that society and humanity knows what they are doing and the harm they are causing to others for absolutely no reason.

Don’t worry, I’m not going to try and pressure or coerce you to join my cause :P. No, for me it is enough that people start talking, start telling their stories to whomever they tell it, for that is all the activism necessary to change the world. Conversation. Simple, open, and honest conversation between two people, or four people, or four hundred people, all sharing their stories and experiencing until that web grows by word of mouth and social networking and day-by-day human interaction to the point where the conversation – just the conversation – is so strong and sonorous as to be impossible to silence. Just conversation. Dialogue.

So hi, my name is Asher; would you like to converse?