So you're probably wondering now...
WHAT HAPPENED TO MONDAYS?
Well, there's an explanation as well as a lesson to be learned here.
As you already know, if you've kept up with my journey, during the time my family was able to do the most for others, we happened to be homeless ourselves. No one knew at the time that we lived in our car, and no one would have ever assumed, since we did so much to help other people.
Sadly, the few people I did confide in with this personal information ended up abandoning me. One chose to no longer be my friend, some assumed we "chose" to be homeless and they criticized me for their ignorant assumptions.
For whatever their reasons, I learned the hard way that our circumstance was best kept a secret.
Let me state for the record that we NEVER chose to be homeless!
There were times when we could have stayed in a shelter, but like many homeless families, we chose not to be separated, with dad in one shelter and mom and the kids in a completely different unsafe place clear across town.
There were times when friends would offer that we stay with them. Unfortunately, my husband's pride would not allow this and I had to decline the offer being someone eager to please God by obeying my husband's wishes.
At the end of the day, no matter how many options we were faced with, based on our personal circumstances (everyone's are different), living in our car together was really our best and only option at the time, so that's what we ended up doing, for lack of more appealing choices.
We had everything we needed, really. We had food, clothing, and although it wasn't an ideal or comfortable place, we had a place to lay our heads. That was much more than we could say for many other homeless people, and therefore we were grateful despite our lack of a permanent housing structure.
So as I mentioned in my previous post, helping other people even less fortunate than us, who didn't even have a car to sleep in, became what got me through each day.
There's a rule of thumb that you may have heard if you've ever flown in a plane. Your flight attendant will announce before take off... be sure, in the event of an emergency, that you put the oxygen mask on yourself first before helping others who may need your assistance.
This was a completely foreign concept to me when I first heard it. Not only have I never flown, but my natural instinct in the event of an emergency is to help everyone else first. How could I possibly be so selfish?
It was a sermon at church that introduced me to this concept and once he explained why, it was like a revelation for me. I knew that God was telling me that my vision for what I'd like my organization to become could never come to pass if I "kill myself" trying to make it happen. I HAD TO PUT THE OXYGEN MASK ON MYSELF.
This message came to me at a point in time when it had become a daily struggle to continue with our feedings, collect donations each week, answer the phone constantly for all the people who now had my number to call for help.
As much as I loved helping people, it was becoming more of a burden than I could bare and I was no closer to having my own family housed than the day we started. In fact, it was becoming even harder to provide for my own family because the longer we stayed homeless, the more I accepted it as my reality and the less I aspired to be and do something greater, which was what brought me to Atlanta in the first place.
I became aware of the fact that I would stay stuck in this place of poverty if I continued to operate this way. Not only that, but my health began to deteriorate, my marriage fell apart, and I worried that my children would suffer long term if I didn't establish some stability for them soon. That's when I realized, it was time for me to put on the oxygen mask.
As hard as it was for me to do, I decided to focus on self and home first. I set a goal, and still maintain my mission to this day, that we will have hundreds of "FTHT Buildings" across the country that do everything we did for the homeless out in the parks on Mondays.
Our facilities will not only house people, but also provide them with food, clothing, hygiene items, job search assistance, training, and so much more. It will be a "one stop shop" for everything someone needs to get out of homelessness--but in order for me to make it happen, I must first get myself to a place financially in which this vision is a very realistic and current possibility.
If your goal is to do something great that will benefit those around you, you have to realize, just as I did, that you cannot help anyone until your own home, life, finances, etc. are in order. Then, not only will you be established and better equipped to accomplish what it is you were called to do, but you will be much more effective in doing so without the sacrifice of your own mental and physical health and well being. How can you help anyone if you're dead after all? You will do more, go further, and make a bigger impact once you yourself can breathe.
We at "The Feed the Homeless Tour" are building from the ground up and this time we are laying a firm foundation that will not be able to be shaken or destroyed. We will make a bigger impact and end homelessness for more families than we could have ever imagined.
And we will still do it, as our motto says, "One State & One Heart at a Time"... but this time we will start at home and soon we will change the world!
For more information on how you can be a part of the movement...
Email us at thehomelesstour@gmail.com.
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