AS Your Voice

  The Silent Struggle of Our Unhoused Neighbors | AS Your Voice | It’s easy to walk past a tent city or avert our eyes from someone sleeping on a park bench. We might offer a fleeting thought, perhaps even a dollar, but how often do we truly pause to consider the intricate web of circumstances that leads someone to that point? I remember a particularly cold winter morning last year. As I hurried to grab my coffee, bundled in layers, I saw a woman trying to start a small, sputtering fire in a discarded barrel.  Her face was etched with exhaustion, her hands blue with cold. I t hit me then, with a sharp, undeniable pang, how easily we become desensitized to suffering. We rationalize, we categorize, but beneath it all, there's a human story. The narrative of homelessness often falls into tired tropes : mental illness , addiction , personal failure.  While these factors can certainly play a role, they paint an incomplete and often unfair picture.  The truth is far more...

  The Blame Game: Why We Point Fingers and How to Truly Be Heard  | AS Your Voice | Just a few days ago, I was sitting quietly when sudden, loud voices erupted from the next room.  When I went to see what was happening, I found my two sisters in a heated argument , truly at each other's throats.  Neither of them was actually listening; they were just shouting over each other. Then, my father walked in and asked what was going on.  It turned out the whole fight was over something incredibly small: a few drops of water had spilled on his shirt, which was sitting nearby.  Both sisters were terrified of getting scolded by Dad, so instead of admitting what happened or finding a quick fix, they started furiously blaming each other. "It was  your  fault the water spilled!" one would yell, and the other would immediately retort, "No, it was  yours !" The blame escalated so quickly that what could have been solved by simply pressing the shirt dry, or ...