It's been a shitty week. I've been going through it like a zombie because money is the sole ruler of the universe, therefore a dictator, therefore evil.
Anyway, yesterday I got home and remembered that I promised a friend I’d go see Frank Warren (the creator of Postsecret) with him. He was speaking on campus and I’ve been dying to see him speak. Even though I felt like a load of actual shit, I couldn’t miss the opportunity. I threw on some yoga pants and drove to the auditorium. And honestly, in that hour, my life changed.
The strength of not only the secret senders and Frank himself, but of those also watching him speak was unreal. At the end of the phenomenal and hilarious program, Frank invited people in the audience to come to two microphones set up on each side of the room and reveal a secret if they so wished. The individuals that stood at the microphone laughed, cried, and stood tall telling a room full of strangers their deepest secrets. One girl in particular struck me. She began by telling us a list of things she’s survived: depression, cutting, abusive relationships, etc. The closing of her secret was what got me. She said, “and it pisses me off that overcoming all of that makes me a better person than anything I could ever write on my resume.”
How true though? Your future employer will never know how hard you worked to overcome a mental illness. They'll never know that underneath your recommendations and past employers is a person that’s been so strong. They have no way of knowing that they may be sitting across from the most inspiring, hard working person they've ever met. They'll never know what it took for a person to just make it this far or what prevented them from giving up. I don't think I'll ever forget this girl's secret. It will stick with me forever and a day. <3
After the presentation by Frank, I went to a meeting for a volunteer trip I’m attending this weekend. I didn't know anything about the trip before this meeting except that the cause was survivors of aggression. I soon found that we would be working in a women’s shelter for the weekend, making them breakfast and cleaning out a donation room. I couldn't be more excited! This is exactly what I want to do for the rest of my life and I’m getting a chance to see it first hand. My second favorite thing about the meeting was on of the individuals attending. A guy. Throughout the meeting he expressed his worries about the women being afraid or weary of him and seemed a little uncomfortable, but the fact that he’s even going makes him an awesome person in my eyes. I would have never imagined a male sitting at the table when I walked in for this meeting, and at the end of the weekend I hope to tell him how awesome he is for participating in this, because men like him deserve to hear things like that.
So, I've decided that even when I’m having a horrible day and my world seems like it’s caving in around me, I know that I can look in the mirror and know that I’m a strong person that has overcome more than a lot of people. I can know that one day I’ll help people. That’s my purpose in life, and I can’t quit moving toward that goal. Just gotta keep truckin’.
