Fall 2018
Table of Contents
The Mental Health Issue
In Depth
Explore SectionFrom the Editors
Chances for Healing in Every Moment
My beautiful older sister, Bess 鈥 a smart, passionate, popular soccer star 鈥 killed herself when she was 17. She took my parents鈥 gun, drove to a park, and shot herself in the head. The effect on my family was profound. Though I鈥檓 generally a warm person, for the next 15 years, I avoided people with big emotions, or people who seemed fragile. For me, they were dangerous, unpredictable, unhelpable. I didn鈥檛 want to get too close, for fear of being responsible for them in some way. I limited my range of empathy because I was sure if I went too far, I鈥檇 be swallowed whole.
Read moreThe Surprising Links Between Your Mental Health and Everyone Else鈥檚
Why are anxiety and depression on the rise? Our environments have changed. Our food. Our stress. Our relationships鈥攐ur 鈥渓ost connections.鈥
Travis Lupick
Just the Facts
5 Myths We Need to Stop Believing About Mental Illness
How to reduce stigma in society? Check your facts.
Erin Sagen & Tracy Matsue Loeffelholz
What Is Barbershop Therapy?
Barbers in the South are training as first responders to assist the men in their chairs with their mental health concerns.
Celeste Hamilton Dennis
Commentary
I Stopped Playing the 鈥淪trong Black Woman鈥
We are paying for this myth we鈥檝e bought into with our lives.
Shawn Ricks
What Wildfires Do to Our Minds
A Northern California community offers mental health first aid to survivors of devastating fires.
Dani Burlison
Where Children Discover the Healing Power of Animals
In this sanctuary, at-risk kids begin to understand the parallels between their lives and the lives of injured wild animals.
Isabelle Morrison
The Ways We Are Healed by Nature (Even Houseplants)
Green growing things heal us in surprising ways. Communities are trying to bring plant life to areas that lack it.
Natalie Slivinski
Commentary
I Inherited My Grandfather鈥檚 Trauma鈥攁nd His Healing Culture
Returning to culture is a duty my grandfather believed Native elders had to their communities. He passed this on to me, along with his trauma.
Elizabeth Hawksworth
7 Strategies to Turn Trauma Into Strength
Survivors discover surprising benefits in the process of healing from a traumatic event.
Michaela Haas
What a Society Designed for Well-Being Looks Like
Economic justice goes a long way toward improving mental health up and down the socioeconomic ladder.
Tabita Green
Solutions We Love
Explore Section
5 Reasons
The Midterms Are More Than a Vote Against the President
Here鈥檚 what鈥檚 on the line.
Chris Winters
What the Maps of Hate Groups Reveal
New research offers clues to stop the spread of organized hate groups in the U.S.
Wyatt Massey
People We Love
To Love and Worship Freely: Young Muslim LGBTQ Activists Stand Up
These people are fighting the good fight because LGBTQ+ Muslims shouldn鈥檛 have to sacrifice one identity at the expense of the other.
Shaima Shamdeen
Culture Shift
Explore Section
Books+Film+Music
Indigenous Culture Reasserts Women鈥檚 Power Through Dance
Native women revitalize ceremony to resist the legacy of patriarchy that supports a long-entrenched history of abuse.
Mary Annette Pember
Books+Film+Music
Why Mister Rogers Is the Role Model We Need Right Now
The unconventional children鈥檚 television pioneer celebrated dignity and kindness in the age of mass media.
Stephanie Van Hook
Books+Film+Music
Climate Change and Its Staggering Refugee Crisis
Research confirms that massive migration, into the millions, will be an inevitable consequence of global warming.
Todd Miller
Small Works