This is a series of blogs that Dr. Dickinson wrote after returning from a recent trip to Africa. A few reflections, a few lessons learned. Enjoy the journey. 

Recently, we spent a week in Kibera. If you haven’t heard about it, Kibera is a slum covering a square mile in Nairobi. The amazing thing is that while only a square mile, Kibera holds an estimated 800 thousand to 1 million people.  If you are doing the math, that is a lot of people living in a small number of square feet.  Houses are tiny, streets are tight, and space is at a premium.

If you’ve never seen extreme poverty, it’s hard to describe. It assaults your senses on every core level of your being. Like photographs, your sight captures images of desolation and hopelessness. And every now and then, a bright smile of a child sitting otherwise motionless on the ground. Your sense of smell attempts to separate the scent of smoke, feces, and body odor. But perhaps more than anything else, your sense of justice and rightness are shaken as you grasp to make meaning out the fragments of life before you.

Most people begin processing an experience like this by question asking. “How is it that I have and they don’t?” or “Who has forgotten about these people?” or “How did things get to be the way that they are?” Often feelings of guilt, shame, remorse, weight, and responsibility start to emerge. If you allow them, these feelings can drive you away. Back to comfort, safety, and familiarity. However, if you are willing, you can choose to leverage your questions and feelings in such a way, that you become connected. You become engaged.

In every experience I’ve had getting to know people who live in slum conditions, I find it to be so fascinating that when you peel back the layers of perceived differences, we are all far more alike than we are different. Sure, they aren’t writing a blog on their iPad, and without a doubt they face daily challenges that I can only imagine. However, buried under all the differences, is a universal construct that crosses every demographic and unites every human being. We all have a story.

As we were in Kibera working, we witnessed a lot of stories. Stories from moms, soldiers, teachers, thieves, children, pastors, and construction workers. Stories in the context of destruction, violence, hopelessness, pain, and hunger. Yet, stories filled with courage, determination, resilience, hope, and love.

We are going to tell some of those stories in this series. Rather than being a bystander, we invite you to witness. We encourage you to be think about your story and what themes you hold in common with others around you, and around the world. We also encourage you to think about why your story matters. Your story matters because it is the same as someone else’s story. By telling your story, you tell theirs as well. Become a witness. Engage your story.

Wendy Dickinson, Ph.D
WDickinson@ GROWcounseling.com