Personal Narrative: Recovering Hard

At the age of nine, I watched my uncles lowering my father into the ground and what took his life was addiction. All my life I have watched addiction take over the lives of people, I love. My father's side of the family, besides my grandparents, has always faced addiction. Although, addiction runs through my blood, I will not take the same path I have watched people take all my life. I will be the one to end the cycle. Watching the majority of my family waste their life has motivated me to change the direction and better myself from living a life of addiction and misery.

My personal goals are centered on healing. In this world of decreasing resources and increasing and ever diverse populations, there are unmet needs, confusions, and misunderstandings—the very stuff of conflicts and wars. It has been my experience and observation that what the world (and especially me) needs most is a transformation that involves healing, which I believe can lead to a greater measure of peace. That is to say, I have come from a heritage that is troubled with addictions and the abuse and generational cycles of violence that so often accompany addictions. However, I am a survivor, and I continually strive to go forward healing from this past. In time, I came to acknowledge my need for skills in conflict transformation and peace

Growing up with a father in the military, you move around a lot more than you would like to. I was born just east of St. Louis in a city called Shiloh in Illinois. When I was two years old my dad got the assignment to move to Hawaii. We spent seven great years in Hawaii, we had one of the greatest churches I have ever been to name New Hope. New Hope was a lot like Olivet's atmosphere, the people were always friendly and there always something to keep someone busy. I used to dance at church, I did hip-hop and interpretive dance, but you could never tell that from the way I look now.

I feel a sense of calmness wash over me. My thoughts are peaceful and positive. I am confident and capable. I sleep a deep, healing sleep. I wake in the morning refreshed and renewed.

The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. As long as I can remember me have trouble with reading and I did not know why I was bad at it. My patients eventually came to the conclusion that I had mental problems with reading. I was then put in special reading classes to help with my problem. This brought down my self respect making me feel stupid. This went on for about seven year till I went to high school when I stopped being that kid in the corner. I analyzed my problem to the best of my ability to find out what the trouble I was having and I started to focus on the papers that were important. I got over my problems with reading and on my way to graduate. Overcoming and adapting to the problem that

On June 27th, 2016, I severely fractured my tibia, fibula, and ankle after an approximate 20-foot climbing fall. It was the worst injury in my outdoor athletic career. The following four months since the accident consisted of surgery, immobilization, rehabilitation, and ultimately returning to sporting fitness. I was told the damage was so bad that I might have a permanent limp, which would effectively end climbing, skiing, and running. The toughest part is to admit you yourself that you made a mistake and it has the potential to affect an athletic and outdoor lifestyle. I didn’t have a lot of hope after the accident, but over the course of the recovery, I grew stronger, not only in body, but in mind as well. Injury and

Starting over. Those two simple words pretty much sum up where I am at in my life at the moment. I am a 34 year old mother of three. I have never been to college. My husband just recently left me. It has been a whirlwind summer to say the least, but before I get into what brought me back to school, I'll start at the beginning. I was born in FL., and quite literally spent all my time either at the beach or running bare foot on my grandparents farm. I loved every second. Shortly after I turned 8 my mom met my step-dad, and we were quickly headed on our first big adventure, moving to Texas! While I missed my family in FL., I can not tell you enough how happy I was that my mom married my dad. He has been a rock and solid foundation for me my whole

After suffering the past four years from multiple concussions with limited help, you begin to feel that recovering is just about impossible. I have essentially been at the same recovery level the past four years with only small improvements in my well-being. The Doctors I had gone to in the past were very limited in what they could do for me. Until rcently if you asked me if I ever felt I would be able to fully recovery from my concussions the answer would be, no. This answer completely changed after returning from Cerebrum Health Centers in Dallas, Texas. I was very fortunate to have come across Cerebrum when I was looking for information for my website. Shortly after I had found out about the Brain Center I was on a plane to Dallas to go

For my 28-day experiential exercise I was determined to renounce sweets and pastries. I have been trying to lose weight for some time, which I have been successful, however I gave up sweets id loose much more weight. I have been able to lose a substantial amount of weight but it has taken me some time. But, because I love sweets, it had become impossible for me to reach my goal. Before starting this experiment, I would say that I was addicted to sweets such as pastries, macarons, milk-shakes, ice creams, and cake.

When I was a child, I moved around quite a bit. It became hard to get attached to places because we were never assured that the sacred spots would be ours for much longer. As I got older, however, I have realized that special places do not have to be dictated by a length of time, and allowing myself to fall in love with a place gave me the roots I had been searching for. While I have not lived in Indiana for several years now, there is something about this certain cluster of trees in Indiana that remain special to me. When I was a child, I saw them as the gateway into Narnia, and during the winter snows I would bundle up in my cheap fur coat my mother bought at a consignment shop and run outside searching for Mr. Tumnus and calling myself Lucy. My imagination gave me the ability to bring the characters I loved so dearly to life. This experience has shown me that providing children with the ability to use their imagination not only provides entertainment, but also allows children to have a safe outlet to cope with traumatic situations, make

There I was on the block next to the High Bar. It was about 5:00 at night when my coach told me to do a Kip. As I got up on the bar my nose filled with the smell of chalk. I started to swing, and as I came out of my half turn I looked good. Everything seemed fine but as I came to the part of the Kip where I have to pull my legs up to the bar, I slammed my shins into the bar. My momentum was stopped and I dropped on to the mat, missing the Kip. I felt like I had let down my coach and I had let down myself too. That day I experienced failure. That failure made me want my Kip even more so I worked harder and had support from my teammates.

Well this year was a hell of a year. I mean, i didn't pass any of the semesters but i did observe a ton of stuff that went on in the class. The class in general was pretty lit. Every day went by and i honestly did some work. The class was ready to learn as mrs g was ready to teach. I mean yea we had some days were we didn't want to learn anything and there were also days when mrs g didn't want to teach. But ima be honest, doing the work we did wasn't in my best interest. Most of the projects we did in class i worked on, but at the end i didn't end up liking how i did it so i wouldn't even bother turning anything in. like the obituary we had to write about ourselves. I liked the meaning behind this but honestly i didn't want to work on that because it just brought back memories of my friends that were killed.

The lessons we take from failure can be fundamental to later success. Recount an incident or time when you experienced failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?

My feet pound the track. I take deep breaths and pump my arms in rhythm with my steps. My muscles ache but my mind is focused, I am in the zone and I feel invincible, moving faster than ever before. Run, rest, repeat. The cycle of intervals in the workout let me just tune out and push myself. The only problem is, as I run each interval I feel a nagging pain in my leg. The pain slowly increases until I realize the worst: I might be injured.

PROMPT #2: PROMPT #2: The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?