Latest / Beyond the Arc: Reflections on Resilience, Identity, & Life Podcast / Surviving Was Just the Beginning

Transcript

Surviving Was Just the Beginning · Beyond the Arc: Reflections on Resilience, Identity, & Life Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Beyond the Arc.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Amy Gamble.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Have you ever looked back on your life and realized
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: that something you once thought might destroy you actually became part
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: of a much bigger story?
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Recently, I found myself reflecting on my memoir, Unsilenced, and what the book is really about.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: What began as a simple reflection turned into a deeper understanding
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: of perseverance, finding my voice, and ultimately finding peace.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: Today's essay is called, Surviving Was Just the Beginning.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: Have you ever noticed when you physically create space that it often carries
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: over to your mental capacity too?
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: Stuff takes up energy, kind of like emotional baggage as well.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: I've noticed that sometimes my greatest reflection moments come when I least expect it.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: I was sitting in the living room watching a YouTube video on the seven elements
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: that make a good memoir.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: I only made it through the first three before I began typing away on the keyboard.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: The third element was emotional honesty.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: Before that, it was personal transformation and universal truths.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: That was enough to spark me into analyzing what the actual subject of Unsilence,
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: my memoir published in 2023, was really about.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: The subject is not really about healing from trauma or bipolar disorder.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: The subject is reclaiming personal power, finding your voice,
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: reclaiming your identity, and discovering what becomes possible
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: after surviving experiences that threaten to define I hadn't really written much
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: about the election or politics, but in a discussion with my sister today,
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: I reminded her that many people felt disenfranchised, not heard, overlooked,
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: not having a voice, and left behind.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: This is what seemingly led to many people lining up behind one party or another.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: She said, I felt that way.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: I felt as if people tried to put me down because I didn't go to college.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: They treated me as if they were better than me.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: And there it was, an aha moment waiting to be realized.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: I answered, I understand what it's like to be discounted, overlooked, written off, and left out.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: When people treat you differently because of your diagnosis,
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: when they think they're better than you because they never had to deal
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: with what you did, when they're judging you and discounting all of who you are,
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it's similar to being thought you're less than because you don't have
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: a college degree.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: I then went on a tangent, which I'll spare you the details of.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: The gist is, I said how important it is to me to have a voice,
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: to stand up for those who can't stand up for themselves,
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: to encourage others to use their voice, essentially to encourage people, everyone,
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: to become unsilenced.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: There are people I know who have so much to offer.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: But because they've been beaten down one too many times,
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: they question whether it's worth it to be seen, heard, acknowledged.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: Some give up their dreams before they're realized because they can't find
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: the courage to be vulnerable.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: What I've learned through writing and sharing what I write,
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: from speaking to thousands of people over the years,
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: it's that the courage to be vulnerable will return to you a million times
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: over a healthy dosage of internal strength.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: Let me say that one more time.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: The courage to be vulnerable will return to you a million times
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: over with a healthy dosage of internal strength.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: When we speak up, we are heard.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: You know the saying, the squeaky wheel gets the grease.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's true for humans too.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: When we own our histories, oftentimes painful parts of our past,
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: and when we acknowledge, of course,
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: there are things that we could have done better or differently.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: However, we give ourselves the gift of forgiveness.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: And as Maya Angelou once said, when you know better, you do better.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: At the same time, I've come to realize since writing Unsilence that forgiveness
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: of self and others is a necessary step in our healing.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: There will be things in life that are quite honestly just flat-out unfair, wrong,
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: and a terrible injustice done to each and every one of us.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know anyone who hasn't been in a position where they might say,
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: Life just isn't fair from one time or another.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it's not fair.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes people do and say some really terrible things.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we do some crappy things too.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not immune from intentionally or unintentionally hurting other people.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: I'm human.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: I used to beat myself up terribly when I thought I'd made a mistake
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: or hurt someone's feelings, said the wrong thing.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: I'd ruminate over it There was a moment not too long ago when I said to myself, wow,
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: Amy, you're kind of being tone deaf in that situation.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: But there was nothing I could do to change what I'd said.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: All I could do was learn from my mistake.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: When I think about the universal message of unsilence,
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: I believe it is the past doesn't have to determine your future.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: The ghosts and goblins hiding under all of our beds can be haunting.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: And this is when seeing them, acknowledging them,
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: and doing some good old-fashioned cleaning can clear out that kind of energy.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_00: My mother once said to me, when you're finished writing Unsilence,
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: do you think you can throw it over your shoulder?
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: Her way of saying, let it go.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: At the time she said that, which was nearly four years ago, my answer was, I wasn't sure.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: But if she were here today, I'd tell her, yes,
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: I can throw it over my shoulder and move forward with my life.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: I've learned that the theme that resonates predominantly through most
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: of my writing is the promise that never giving up can almost always yield
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: a positive outcome.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: It might not be the outcome we had our hearts set on, but it can still be positive.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: I can't guarantee it, but I know for sure that perseverance has paid off for me
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: in every shape and form imaginable.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: I can hear my mother telling me years ago, Amy, you don't quit.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: You don't give up.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: And God knows I wanted to.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: Because sometimes the very thought of persisting is exhausting.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yet I persisted.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: I kept going.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: And life isn't all a bed of roses.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: But I found my peace.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: More than anything I ever desired in life,
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: all I ask in my prayers for was to let me have peace.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: I've learned we can make peace with where we've been and who we've become
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: while remaining open to everything we have yet to discover.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: There's no artificial timeline to arriving at where you want to be in life.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: But what I want to promise you is that no matter what you have endured,
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: your story isn't finished.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: My journey I write about in Unsilence is not only what happened to me,
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: but how I survived and ultimately how I learned to thrive.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_00: As it turns out, surviving was just the beginning of my story.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: I imagine it's the same for your story too.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening to Beyond the Arc.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: If there's one thing I hope you take away from today's reflection,
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: it's that your past doesn't have to determine your future.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we become so focused on getting through life's difficulties
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: that we forget there may be an entirely different life waiting for us
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: on the other side.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: If this essay resonated with you,
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you'll share it with someone who might need a little encouragement
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: to keep going.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: You can find more of my writing and books at amygamble.com.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, keep moving forward.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: Your story isn't finished.