Light at the end of the Tunnel

Well, it has been awhile since I have been on here. I am the kind of person who often starts projects and then lets them fall through the cracks…especially when I am busy. Which, oh boy, am I busy. However, the project I have been busy working on lately is what I want to talk to you all about today.

This last month, I have been pretty much consumed with my social justice committee’s biggest event of the year: Tunnel of Oppression. For those of you not familiar with Tunnel, it is an interactive program designed to expose its participants to a wide range of social issues facing the world today using acted scenes, monologues, multimedia and a wide range of facts. The first Tunnel was actually started in my home state at Western Illinois University in 1983, and this last Tuesday and Wednesday was Texas Tech’s 9th year holding the program. We had over 500 students, faculty and staff go through.

Although I was worried about our Tunnel not doing enough, it actually went really well. We had 11 rooms covering the following topics: Ethnocentrism, Bias, Privilege, Body Image, Transgender, Relationship Violence, Racism, Sexual Assault, Disabilities, and LGBT/Suicide. The scenes were created to relate specifically to the issues on Texas Tech’s campus. The final room before debriefing with counseling and housing staff was called the “Hall of Hope”, and that is the room I want to focus on today.

After going through all scenes, Hall of Hope was designed, as its title implies, to give hope. There were four different tables set up in it, three of which had activities and one with take-home information. Two of the tables were dedicated to a project called “Tell Tech”, which was our version of “Post-Secret”. At these tables, students were encouraged to take the markers and paper we gave them to write a secret about themselves relating to the many issues they confronted in the tunnel. Once the card was created, they were told to either hang it up on the clothes lines in the room or put it in a box for us to hang up. The remaining table was called “Healing Raiderland”, which also offered paper and markers to students to write with. However, this time they were told to write things they could do to make Tech a better place and to correct these social issues. I was unsure people would participate, but they did, and the results were amazing.

What was extraordinary about the cards was not simply that student, faculty, and staff participated, but that they truly divulged a piece of themselves. Once a few cards were hung up on the lines, the responses came pouring in. We had so many after the first day that we ran out of clips, and had to take them down so that the second day groups could participate. Before the end of second day, we ran out of room for participants to put them up again and had to start laying them out on the tables. Some hurt your heart to read. Some made you want to take on the world. Some simply offered hope. But ALL of them proved that all the issues covered in Tunnel of Oppression effect people all around us. This is what impacted me most in Tunnel.

I work every day to spread the word of social justice, but there is always much more for me and others to learn. We often place these issues on a pedestal and assume they happen elsewhere, but these cards proved that there were people I knew personally that had the weight of the world on their shoulders. Although I didn’t know all their names, I often saw a student hanging up a card or placing it in a box, and had a face to pair to the words. It made it all so personable, and I gasped multiple times at the words I saw scribbled down on these harmless little pieces of paper.

Below I have posted just a few of the many cards we received those two days. From stories of racism to rape to abuse to self-loathing to pride to hope, these cards told the story of oppression in our society better then any of our scenes ever could. I encourage you to read the few below and reflect on the fact that these are the people of today and these are the things they are facing. Sometimes we get so caught up in the fact that things are better that we forget that our job is far from done.

The final impact moment actually came from another student trying to take in everything written on these papers. As I was reading them at the end of the second day, one of the actors  came up to me after also reading the cards. Clearly overwhelmed, he asked, “So, where is this hope in all of this?” It was such a sincere question, and I could see the emotion in his eyes. I know it is easy to get caught up in the bad, and I know he felt helpless. But there is beauty is all the pain, and a point to activities like this. There only answer I could come up with:

The hope…the light…at the end of Tunnel is this: We are not alone. And together, we can beat this.

             

If you would like any more information about Tunnel of Oppression, or some ideas to implement at your own institutions, please feel free to comment below or email me.

Cultivating minds; A purpose for my words

Welcome to my journey. I hope that on this blog, we will be learning a lot about each other. This is a new experience for myself, and one I hope will be rewarding. Like my research professor is insisting I do with my upcomingpaper, I feel that most appropriate way to begin this is to start with a “Statement of Purpose.” Why am I here? What will this all mean?

As many of you will learn, I have a slight obsession with the movie Eay, Pray, Love. For those of you who have not seen it, it is based off the book by Elizabeth Gilbert, who went through a time of internal crisis and depression after filing for divorce. To find herself, she followed the wise words of a medicine man, and bought three tickets that had her traveling across the world for a year in search of herself. In the end, she finds her balance again. I have collected quotes for many, many years, and Liz’s words make up a good chunk of those I have recorded. The book and the movie are filled with dozens of beautiful notions about love, life, and self-discovery.

Midway through my undergraduate degree, I went through a similar tough time filled with depression and loss of purpose. I won’t go into details right now, but when I was lost in sea of hurt and confusion, I also used the idea of traveling as an anchor. I wanted to get away to find myself and to heal, as well. When I came upon Eat, Pray, Love, I drank up Liz Gilbert’s words. The lessons of her story helped me during that time (I did end up traveling), and they continue to inspire me. One such quote, depicted in the featured image of this post, has stuck with me ever since. While Liz grapples with feelings of loss, lack of fulfillment and how to handle these feelings, her friend offers her this advice: 

” You need to learn how to select your thoughts just the same way you select your clothes every day. This is a power you can cultivate. If you want to control things in your life so bad, work on the mind. That’s the only thing you should be trying to control.”  

In a time when I was trying to control every aspect of my life in order to heal, these words taught me several important things. The first is that I cannot stop life from happening. It happens, often not how I want it to, and it is out of my hands. However, it also showed me that how I react to events and how I look at the world, are things that I do have control over. In fact, they are the most important things to have power over. With these words in mind, the younger me attempted to stop looking at the past, stop over-planning for the future, and begin looking within. I started looking at my thoughts and my feelings, and started to discover how to alter my outlook and reaction to life’s many challenges. And do you know what happened when I did this? I healed. I gained a voice I had previously stopped myself from using, and a feeling of self-assurance that everything would work out the way it should. And if it didn’t, I could handle it. 

So, this brings me to why I am starting this blog. Once again, I find myself in a time of great change. As make the transition from undergrad to graduate school in a completely new state with brand new people, a lot of things are up in the air. Although the unfamiliar is hard to deal with, and sometimes (very) scary, the one thing that I can control is how I acknowledge this transformation. I want to make the best out of this, not just for my career, but for myself. This is the perfect time for me to take charge of my mind and expand on the many thoughts running through my head. I want to use them for a greater purpose, and  I want to take it a step further than I have in the past. I want to take the time out for myself to explore those many thoughts about life, love and this process, and put them into words. And more importantly, I want to share them with you.

As a person who is studying Higher Education and has “Intellection” as their top Strengths Quest, I have a passion for knowledge and development. So, this blog will serve as something to expand both areas. I will examine article, favorite quotes, art, books, and my own experiences in life and love, and put them into words. Through this, I should have a better understanding of myself, which will hopefully give me the strength I need to excel. I also hope to give more understanding to all of you if you’re willing to read. 

In short, I hope to cultivate my mind and yours.