#it takes a village

After seeing the impact @ReclaimYourVoice events were having on people’s lives, I became passionate about continuing the work. My fear of public speaking was still something I had to deal with and it was a challenge every time I had to stand in front of the room as the host. But not only did I keep doing it, I also found myself going to open mics around the city so that I could let people know about our events. I would perform my Firefly poem and then finish by speaking about Reclaim Your Voice. I must admit I surprised myself; I’d spent my entire life fiercely dreading ever being on stage and here I was taking the initiative to do so because I believed in this cause so much. I was doing things to raise awareness for the survivor community that I was never willing to do for myself with my photography business. I was now willing to try and fail. I was willing to face rejection. I was willing to face my greatest fears. And despite the fact that this meant constantly making myself uncomfortable, and despite the fact that I was doing all of this for free(dom), I had never felt more fulfilled in my life.

The Return of @ReclaimYourVoice || 2012 was the first time I stepped away from my photography work to simply enjoy life and my blissful relationship with Paul. Even the idea of @reclaimyourvoice had been shelved because although I felt like it was something I would attempt again at some point in the future, I didn’t have the drive to make it happen anytime soon due to the toll the first one had taken on me.⁣
⁣
That summer, Paul introduced me to his friends and among these gifted, conscious poets I found my soul family. I met @freemase@missbrittab@_nattybynature@xvxyphoto@dream_manifestation_specialist@7am1r@lighthaus.i@morgan124875and@randelladjeiwho had coincidentally founded @rise_edt a mere four days after the first @reclaimyourvoiceevent.⁣
⁣
I was so amazed by this group of people that I decided to host another Reclaim Your Voice event with two major changes: the first event had been for women only but after meeting these wonderful men I felt I needed to involve them. I strongly believed that women who’d been abused needed to know that kind, caring men like these existed. And this time around I would incorporate spoken word poetry as well because through the work of these artists I came to see what a powerful medium it could be for self expression.⁣
⁣
Many more people showed up at the second Reclaim Your Voice event. I was concerned, however, that the women who would be sharing their personal stories of abuse might feel uncomfortable having men in the room. Instead they were overjoyed to see them there, these men who were willing to listen and learn and support. That in itself provided a sense of healing. The spoken word poetry added another level of depth to the event and I was so grateful for the way things were coming together.⁣
⁣
Then@Randelladjei stood up to share his poem, but instead of doing so, and inspired by the women he’d just heard share their stories, he spoke for the first time about the abuse he had experienced in the past. In that moment @ReclaimYourVoice stopped being an event solely for women and became a place where all people who had experienced abuse or sexual violence could share their stories. ⁣