A pair of Louis Vuitton sunglasses, a new DSLR camera, a compound bow, or 249 Big Macs (including tax). I could use the $1,000 to purchase any of the items listed, which indeed sound fairly appealing, but none of them would truly help me in the long run (especially those Big Macs). Instead, I could save the $1,000 to use around Thanksgiving time and help out my community a little more. Each year, my family and I go out and buy the following in bulk: toothbrushes, toothpaste, combs, fuzzy socks, deodorant, beanies, gloves, candy canes, gift bags, and postcards. In our little workshop we call home, we spend a day or two making sure each gift bag has the same amount of each item, and end up with 20-30 bags. Together with our church group, we typically end up with over 100-150 bags, ready to be given to people in need of these basic living items. Then, right before Thanksgiving, we head out to town and hand them out to any homeless people we see, and wish them happy holidays. If I had $1,000, I would be able to add a distributed amount of money in each bag and allow them to get themselves an early holiday gift. Maybe they would use that to buy some Big Macs.

My perfect weather, toes-in-the-sand, virgin piña colada-sipping-filled summer came to an abrupt halt last year when my history with my sexual abuser was exposed. While it was always something I knew I would face at some point in my life, I always thought it would be when I was ready. Unfortunately, everything became hectic and I felt like I wouldn't make it through that summer. Two months later, I met with a therapist for the first time and finally felt heard, for the first time in a long time. She reminded me that I wasn't alone even though it felt like it, and although everyone says it, it always stands true. There is hardly ever a truly unique experience in this world, for better or for worse. In my case, I knew that there were people who had experienced the same situation as I did and had the same reaction as I did. What was unique about it, in my opinion, was my journey afterwards. With my therapist, we created a general plan, including several goals I wanted to make with communicating better with friends and family, expressing my emotions in a healthy manner, and most importantly, loving myself. I had a fairly rocky start; I had to go from crisis-mode straight to school and face a deteriorating romantic relationship. The first phase of my therapist's plan was to face what made me distressed in general and in any given moment. Every week, our session would begin with a body check-in, which is something that I've learned to do every so often. We practiced breathing techniques, meditations, and my favorite activity: writing. I would write pages and pages of my day and my feelings and everything I wanted to outside of our sessions. In the second phase, I learned several mindfulness techniques stemming off from some of the basic breathing and meditation techniques she introduced in phase one. As I would check in with my body, I would also check in with my mind. When I felt myself getting tense out of nowhere, or felt my heart beating faster and faster, I would check in and think back to what specific thought had me react that way. From there, we ascertained that having a specific thought typically elicited a negative physiological response, so we worked on changed that thought. One by one, we worked our way through my many doubts and fears about the future, giving me the space to grow my self-esteem and truly recognize my self-worth. Finally, we worked through my personal relationships and how I can best navigate them using all of my new skills. With my sense of self-worth being stable, I was in the capacity to fully listen and acknowledge my friends' and family's thoughts and feelings without doubting myself or feeling targeted. If faced with a triggering conversation, I knew that I could use the breathing techniques we practiced to calm down and express my emotions about that topic. The best thing about this was that I could physically feel whenever a troubling topic would occur, so I could prepare for it before having to confront it in the first place. I am in the processing of finishing up my DBT journey with my therapist, but I can use all of my skills to help others and encourage them to use them as well.

When I first started going to therapy the summer before my second year of undergrad, I did not expect myself to feel such relief after one session. My therapist made me notice the tension in my shoulders, neck, throat, and hands, all of which I had never paid any attention to. After several months of guidance from my therapist and hard work from me, I can recognize my self-worth, enabling me to help others that may need similar recognition. As a psychology student, mental health is a topic that we constantly integrate into our classes and discussions. While it's safe to say that there isn't a perfect solution to combatting mental health, there still exists one particularly simple and useful solution to help people who struggle with mental health: listen. In more recent years, therapy has become less stigmatized for good reason. In my personal experience, therapy has always been a place where I can easily let go of all of my frustrations and eagerness about anything. Not only that, there are endless types of therapy that can cater to a specific person's needs, depending on their past and what they need help unburdening in their life. Unfortunately, therapy can be very expensive and not everyone has the means to access a local or virtual therapist, let alone afford it. For this reason, it is imperative to listen to a friend in need. Although professional clinic training can provide the best results, simply lending an ear allows the person to feel heard and, most importantly, not alone.