Done with Shaoyang

Well folks, I'm officially done with teaching in Shaoyang. I spent my day busing, flying, and taxi-ing my way to Beijing for a few days vacation before I head back home to the USA!

I'll write something more substantive when I haven't been awake for 18 hours!

As We Forgive Those Who Trespass Against Us

This past week I started watching "Glee". I know, I know, I'm a bad gay. But I've really gotten into it. It's a really enjoyable show with a great balance of humor and drama. I've already finished Season One and I'm well on my way to finishing Season Two.Yes, I am a Gleek now.

I've also discovered that it is one of the few shows that can reduce me to a blubbering, tear-soaked mess. This is largely due to the story lines revolving around Kurt, the openly gay teen who is a member of the McKinley High Glee Club. Watching his trials and tribulations has brought up a lot of long buried feelings and emotions.

I've written about my experiences with bullying growing up, so I won't bore you by rehashing the details, you can read them for yourselves.

Needless to say, Kurt is a TV character I can really relate to. But it got me thinking about those people that inflicted so much harm upon me. I haven't seen any of them in over 10 years, but deep down, I've been letting the bullying continue. And I've been just a cruel as they ever were, because for over a decade I was doing the bullying to myself.

I was letting their ignorance and hatred poison my self-worth, and self-esteem. My life philosophy is that our lives are too short and precious to waste them trying to please other people that don't matter. But I should have added a caveat to that philosophy: Life is too short and precious to waste time trying to please other people that don't matter, or letting their irrelevant views poison your own life.

So tonight I did something I never thought was necessary, or even possible: I forgave.

I forgave the bullies for making my life a living hell making me feel inferior.

I forgave the adults who could have taken action to try and protect me and did not.

Most importantly, I forgave myself. I forgave myself for letting a bunch of idiots I haven't seen in years dictate how I feel about myself and how I relate to the world.

And, in my mind, I went to the scared, lonely little boy that resorted to hiding in a church bathroom rather than go to Sunday School, and I did what I wish someone had really done for me: I gave him a big hug and told him that it was OK, that everything was going to be alright, and that he should be proud of who he is.

Kids are cruel, that's life. The things we do to each other when we're young can hurt, and they leave wounds. But we shouldn't have to carry those wounds with us for the rest of our lives.

I don't like negativity. I avoid it as much as I can. But I realized that while I was working so hard to avoid the negativity of others, I was festering in an ocean of my own self-directed negativity. And although I wasn't the one who put the ocean there, I wasn't doing anything to get myself across it.

Hatred is like radioactivity. A lot can kill you all at once, but having just a little bit in your system will work just as effectively, and far more cruelly. It gets in your blood and in your bones, it radiates throughout you, destroying your heart and mind and soul.

I have not been respecting myself like I should have been all along. Deep down, I had made myself believe all the horrible things that bullies had said about me. But that had to stop, and tonight, I took a big step toward doing that.

But it's going to be a difficult journey. Hatred becomes a habit. It's safe and comfortable, you don't have to question it. I'm going to have to work hard to get myself out of that mindset. Forgiveness is only the first step, but I think it is also the most important.

Here I'm reposting my video contribution to the It Gets Better Project, designed to help kids who are victims of bullying and are considering suicide as a way out.