“Dear Lotus Flower,
Just like you, my roots were always latched in the mud. I envied you because you were in the dark, murky water only at night—when the daylight arose, you bloomed. Unlike you, I was submerged in nasty water every day and night, but the light abandoned me. Came the morning light, and somehow miraculously, you rebloomed, sparkling, and so clean. I sort of bloomed at night with the moonlight and stars. However, the next morning I wasn’t so lucky because the morning light was nowhere to be found. Things got better for me slowly but surely. I must say, no matter how many times our roots were in the dirtiest water, we survived. We survived because our roots provided the nutrients that allowed us to bloom.”
Source: Pinwheels and Dandelions
“Dear Fire in the Sky,
I know that you know well enough what tainted love is. I wonder, is that why you destroy any and everything that crosses your path? I want to let you know that I feel your pain, but not all love is tainted. I know it is hard to trust, but sometimes we have to take a chance. There was a time when nobody could put out my fire, not even water. The wind knew my pain because it helped fuel my fire, and it spread effortlessly without even trying. My heart was bruised in ways that nobody could ever imagine. However, I survived. I’ve had many days that used to be uncertain. Now, I am exactly where I belong.
I am home.”
Source: Pinwheels and Dandelions
“There was a time when nobody could put out my fire, not even water. The wind knew my pain because it helped fuel my fire, and it spread effortlessly without even trying.”
Source: Pinwheels and Dandelions
“We sat in good silence, for me relieved silence, watching the thick rush-hour traffic and the jammed streetcars -- all leaving us behind, leaving me feeling cast off and useless, remembering when I too hate somewhere to go, something to do.”
Source: Upstairs In The Crazy House: The Life Of A Psychiatric Survivor
“Sure, some rich people work hard – but so do koilawalas, construction workers, and domestic helpers. Other bases of privilege have little to do with personal merit: our aptitudes, health, inheritance, social connections, and other assets derive from contingencies (such as the accident of birth) over which we have no control. Even our education reflects inherited circumstances, and our parents’ and teachers’ efforts, far more than our own. All this is without going into the fact that wealth and power often build on corruption, exploitation, and crime”
Source: Sense and Solidarity: Jholawala Economics for Everyone
“It's time to start living the life you've imagined.”
“Eventually, he brought me a translation of the Islamic Holy Book, the Quran, and one night, as I read, I came across a sura that touched me so deeply, moved me so profoundly, it was as though God had whispered in my ear. My life didn't change, the circumstances that plagued me -- poverty, exile from the real world, continuous fears about what lay ahead -- didn't change. I wasn't instantly, miraculously cured of the blackness that was rooted in my soul, but I was comforted.
I, who felt and believed that I was beyond even the capability of God to love and forgive, who feared daily retribution of the meanest, vilest kind, cried to the first time since I'd come to this house, not bitterly, not grudging the tears.
'By the morning hours,
And by the night when it is stillest
The Lord hath not forsaken thee
nor doth He hate thee
And verily the latter portion
will be better for thee than the former
And verily thy Lord will give unto
thee so that thou will be content
Did He not find thee an Orphan
and protect thee?
Did He not find thee wandering
and direct thee?
Did He not find thee destitute
and enrich thee?
Therefore the orphan oppress not,
Therefore the beggar drive not away,
Therefore the bounty of thy Lord
be thy discourse.
(Sura 93)'
That verse freed me. I was not an outcast, not hated by a God who could love and forgive everyone but me. In time, I could see my being in this house as an act of man, not an act of God. I also began to believe that there might be another reason for my being directed here; I was not here to die, but perhaps to do something about the place and the people. I began to feel I'd been given back purpose.”
Source: Upstairs In The Crazy House: The Life Of A Psychiatric Survivor
“...nothing could easily erase the vision of Alice, crawling with lice, or Mama, eyes clenched shut under one more indignity, one more reminder of who we were, and what we had lost.”
Source: Upstairs In The Crazy House: The Life Of A Psychiatric Survivor
“There was an inevitability about our kind of illness, a knowledge that lurking over the next hill was our private monster, which would grab us, shake us up and eventually deposit us in a hospital bed, doped to the gills with anti-psychotic medication, not remembering much of anything and not caring that we couldn't.”
Source: Upstairs In The Crazy House: The Life Of A Psychiatric Survivor
“Andy had taken my jeans and a pair of his that no longer fit over to the laundromat with some change earned from the owner. He washed and dried them while I waited under the covers in my bed. When he had finished, he presented the two pairs to me with a rare, honest smile. There were few things I would have appreciated more than this, and I did not hesitate to let him know how pleased and happy he'd made me. Those filthy jeans had become my private nightmare, and having only one pair left me in fear of a broken zipper or a tear where it counted. I felt like a child putting on freshly laundered pajamas, cared for, loved.”
Source: Upstairs In The Crazy House: The Life Of A Psychiatric Survivor