i am waiting for the one moment that changes everything.
Catching Elephant is a theme by Andy Taylor
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“Dead Hearts”
Stars“Tell me everything that happened.
Tell me everything you saw.”I have never been able to forget the feeling I had the first time I wanted to be somebody else and began to dream of all the possibilities. The reality settled quickly and overwhelmed me. I was young and had just grasped the concept of change, that I would not always be who I was in that moment. It was exciting because I knew it meant dreaming wasn’t pointless. Everything seemed endless in the best kind of way.
“Did you see the closing window?
Did you hear the slamming door?”Much later I realized the same goes for other people—they would not always be who I thought they were, who I wanted them to be. Unfortunately, I learned this lesson the hard way, and that feeling of infinity was replaced with constriction.
Dead hearts can be something that changes parts inside of you for the worst way or something that reshapes your views and preconceived notions for the better. I know both roads.
“They moved forward, my heart died.
They moved forward, my heart died.”You’re in fifth grade, and your friends say they no longer want to be friends with you because you don’t wear the same jean size. The definition of friendship and what it looked like changes forever.
You’re sixteen, and your hero packs his suitcases after telling your Mom he’s leaving because he met a woman three weeks ago and no longer wants to stay. And everything you thought you knew is broken.
You’re in a three-year relationship, and you learn the boy you love has been unfaithful to you with his ex-girlfriend. You accept the lie that you aren’t enough and believe staying is the only way to prove your worth.
We always have choices, but along with self-realization I didn’t acknowledge how other people’s decisions could create dead hearts in me.
“It’s hard to know they’re out there.
It’s hard to know that you still care.”Little by little the world changes. There are the surprises—the people who bring you back to life and help lay current dead hearts to rest.
The guy following you out of the bookstore late at night rather quickly is bringing you your credit card, not getting ready to attack you.
Your hero, the man who said he couldn’t stay, realizes home with your family is the only place he wants to be.
The high school teacher who keeps questioning and pushing you actually thinks you’re smart, so he’s trying to challenge, not antagonize, you.
“Dead hearts are everywhere.
Dead hearts are everywhere.”I have had my fair share of heartbreaks and disappointments. I know sometimes it can be much easier to focus on everything that’s missing because I do that in my own head. The thing I’ve come to understand is when I do that, it’s my own choice. In those moments, I choose to let the doubt, anxiety, and dead hearts come back to life.
“They make me feel I’m falling down.
They make me feel I’m falling down.”Contending with the past and the people in it can be a battlefield. It’s haunting to know all the different past versions of myself and others still exist in some space. I look back at photos from only a few years ago, and while I still have the memories from those moments, it looks nothing like my life anymore. The old selves, the dead hearts, the ones who made bad decisions, hurt people, were reckless and harmful to myself are no longer present in my life, but sometimes I see their shadows. I laid the former versions of myself and their dead hearts to rest, but their shadows remind me that I still carry them.
“Was there one you saw too clearly?
Did they seem too real to you?”There are things we cannot help, but at the core, we have the ability to change—or not change—who we are. Sometimes it feels like the shadows of people I’ve been are staring back at me, and those former selves I knew might still have some life left in them after all. I cannot change the fact that at times I have been a person I am not proud of.
Instead of dwelling on my inability to change the past, I reconcile who I was with who I am and in doing so give myself the power to believe that who I am is a choice. That belief is by no means easy, but the potential for possibility is enough for me.
—Chloe
TWLOHA Staff
My SOTW last week. All the thoughts I think about “Dead Hearts” by Stars. This was a tough write. Took me a few weeks, but very happy with the final outcome.
I finally wrote down my Fears vs. Dreams while working the booth at Bamboozle. Never easy to name them.
I dreamed of doing a high school program at To Write Love On Her Arms. for over two years. Last year it became a reality and this year we had our first term. Today is the final day for all our Spring 2012 schools. So thankful for all of their support and hard work.
So humbled and honored by the family, friends and former classmates of Kyle Meisenheimer for donating to To Write Love On Her Arms through The Storytellers in his memory. Thank you aren’t the right words. I hope we make you proud.
We turn 6 today, so we’re asking everyone to share why they wear TWLOHA using the #wearTWLOHA hashtag or tagging To Write Love On Her Arms on Facebook. So here’s my shirt for today and I wear TWLOHA because I believe in hope. The thing I love about TWLOHA is that it can mean whatever you want it to. You can take it and make it your own. :)
Check out this awesome display set up for The Storytellers at Woodland Regional High School!!
Love this so much. These student organizers continue to impress me. So thankful for everyone’s hard work.
Dear Everyone Who Supports or Dislikes a Nonprofit,
Please, please before you comment on a nonprofit whether in favor of, or against, know the definition of nonprofit.
Entrepreneur.com gives a great one in layman’s terms:
A business organization that serves some public purpose and therefore enjoys special treatment under the law. Nonprofit corporations, contrary to their name, can make a profit but can’t be designed primarily for profit-making. With a nonprofit, any money that’s left after the organization has paid its bills is put back into the organization. Some types of nonprofits can receive contributions that are tax deductible to the individual who contributes to the organization. Keep in mind that nonprofits are organized to provide some benefit to the public.
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Some Basics to Know:
No one owns a nonprofit. There are no investors/share holders that money raised is given to. Nonprofits have employees. Employees need to have a roof over their head and food to eat, so yes, employees of a nonprofit earn a salary/wage. This is not new, nor is this illegal. Take a look at some nonprofits with an annual revenue in the hundreds of millions and others with an annual revenue under $10 million for some perspective on employee salaries.
Like any for-profit business, nonprofits have expenses. Unfortunately, just because a company decides to be a nonprofit, that does not automatically mean they get office space, equipment, printing costs, material costs, utilities, etc. for free. They must pay for these out of money raised if a private donor or a grant does not cover these expenses.
Nonprofits must put the money they raise after paying bills back into the organization. This is done in accordance with the nonprofit’s mission statement. Typically, putting money back into the organization means: awareness and outreach, programs, advocacy, media, events, grant making, etc. Every nonprofit has a different mission statement. This is why expense breakdowns are different for every organization.
Every nonprofit with an annual revenue of $25,000+ must file a 990 form with the IRS. These are available for the public to view through the IRS, financial postings on the nonprofits website (For example, TWLOHA’s are here and Invisible Children’s are here), and some charity checking websites. Not all non-profits are able to have their finances listed on charity watchdog sites because of the sites requirements, review delays, or guidelines. For example, Charity Navigator currently monitors 5,000 charities and are not taking suggestions for new ones to review as addressed in their FAQ. Many reputable nonprofits will not be listed because of things like that.
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On A Personal Note:
You don’t have to like or support every nonprofit or cause that’s out there. It’s okay to be passionate about only one organization, or hundreds. But regardless of where you fall about an organization, don’t blindly accept everything you read as fact. I have answered more questions / read more negative comments than I can count because, “Someone saw a blog parading as an article that was posted three years ago saying such and such nonprofit was a scam so it must be true!”
99% of the time is not.
Don’t take something at face value. The internet is an incredible resource at your finger tips. Conduct some searches. Read over financials. Look up news articles from reputable publications with real journalists and fact checkers. Talk to people. Contact the nonprofit if (and especially when) you think something is questionable. Once you receive a reply, check the information they gave you against what you’ve researched. If you still have concerns, keep asking questions.
If you do these things, the majority of the time you’re going to discover what you’ve read or heard that made you question the organization was filled with inaccurate, outdated and blatantly false information from someone who is misinformed, uneducated about nonprofits, and lacking credible sources.
With due diligence, together we can eliminate the false information about nonprofits that distracts us from supporting something we care about. And finally, we can get back to everyone’s common goal which is changing the world for better.
-Chloe
Robert and Krista are the two interns helping with The Storytellers high school campaign. They have been absolutely incredible.
We just wrapped up the first month and are so impressed by everyone’s hard work. Two weeks ago Robert and Krista came to us with an idea to make a video for all of the student organizers to keep them motivated as the term continues. They wanted them to know how much their work matters and to encourage them to keep it up.
Check out the video above. There is an awesome little dance number by Krista at the end as well.
