I figured it might be interesting for Bay12ers to share little bits of wisdom, advice, ideas, and philosophy for the absolute hell of it.
I'll go first with a randomly-chosen bit of writing from a child & spousal abuse advocacy group I'm a volunteer counselor for.
--- --- ---
That senseless fear will always linger; the mind-consuming worry of it all falling apart. The hunger pangs of regret... The sorrow of nostalgia as you embark upon the memory of better days.
But with time we learn to hone fear as a tool of survival, rather than a paddle with which to effortlessly glide across an endless sea of depression. Those very real and very damning emotions that grasp at our ankles as we swim blindly, they become as armor against those who would harm us or manipulate us. The all-consuming worry becomes a blazing fire that eats away at laziness and uselessness, always thirsting for progress, action, and happiness. The heart-wrenching stab of regret will become a daily reminder of a time when we were weaker, a constant reason to fight harder, faster, and stronger than ever before. That piercing sorrow that plagues the night and forces us to abandon all prospects of happiness, that very blackness of spirit will invert itself and become conductive to our sanity, a hot-spring of a thousand reasons why we should never cease the fight for happiness, progress, and abuse awareness.
Like a pool of corrosive battery acid, we will take that dark filth that drowns us daily and eats away at our sanity... And we will siphon it into the center of our mind, collect it into a dense ball, and draw from it all the energy we require to survive. We will become human batteries, boasting an endless supply of electric fervor with which to fight our demons and banish those who would do harm unto us and those we live.
Just as life itself slowly begins, we shall process the very negativity we once fled from, and in turn use it to push us further into the positive fields of our reality.
Sadness is but a passing moment, and just as necessary as happiness, for is night not necessary to balance the efforts and effects of day?
Let us not fear the night, but instead draw from it the necessary emotional tools to wage a war against depression, isolation, misery, and abuse.
We are STRONGER because we have survived through such atrocities. We owe it to ourselves, to those before us, and to those yet to come, to find that strength within and use it to its full potential.
We can, and will, win this fight, as other have before. The difference is, we shall hand our weapons over to those who still need them, making sure to offer guidance to the souls that still wander, lost, through the halls of the abused and the broken.
This is a war we cannot possibly lose, so long as we still draw breath.