Okay, I'll be careful, but thank you.
That was in Jackson's Point. On January 1, 2000, at 12:01 in the morning, I made that decision purposely. My life had spiralled down into 22 mental disorders, 3,000 milligrams of medication, institutionalization in psychiatric group homes, jails, shelters, streets, back alleys, blah, blah, blah. I wasn't a nice person and my life was way out of whack.
My saving grace was the fact that I read for 25 years in libraries from coast to coast. Whatever city I was in, I found myself in the library. I got smart, I guess, and when I was really sick and really in bad shape, it came to mind that I could change this because my mind was mine. It wasn't something I was born with; it was something I created; it was something that happened through experience. So I decided, okay, I'll take this moment and create something brand new. That's why I chose January 1, 2000, because it was never going to happen in any of our lives again, another 1,000-year millennium, so it was significant.
When I took that step of hope, I was still living in a group home, I was still on 3,000 milligrams of medication, I still had 22 mental disorders, but now I had something that I never had before. Nobody ever gave it to me; I had to give it to myself. That was hope.
How does it help in helping others? It helps an enormous amount. If you can give someone just a glimmer of reason, a glimmer of something to believe in, something that may be, then with that hope they can begin to build themselves.
I did that. I lacked a lot of support. In fact, I had almost no support. It has taken me nine years to go from sleeping in a back alley and in ditches to sitting at this table, and I did it purposely. I knew that one day I was going to be sitting at a government table, something with the government, to make the issue known about homelessness and poverty.
That's the honest-to-God truth. I knew I was going to be there. So with that hope in mind, I went forward.
You have to give those who are on the streets a reason to want to get off the streets. You cannot just come down to the streets on a Friday or Saturday afternoon. There have to be front-line workers. Those front-line workers have to invest in the community, just like a missionary does when he or she goes on the mission field.
I'm not preaching here, but when missionaries go on the mission field, they assimilate themselves into the community. They become part of that community. Then they can properly address the issues of the community they're dealing with. If you can find the front-line workers and invest in the front-line workers, for the front-line workers to be able to invest themselves into the community, then you'll start to see people who have hope. When you empower people, it's unstoppable what they can do.
I tell people this and I tell them this all the time: it should only take three years to get off the streets. It should only take three years to rebuild yourself after being chronically homeless. It took me nine years because I did it on my own.