Dissecting My Passions

In the past week we have discussed finding our passions and looking for things that we could focus on for projects. To take a deeper look we made heartbreak maps. A heartbreak map is an idea that came from Angela Maiers, in which you look at what breaks your heart about things you love. You can read more about it here->  ow.ly/PEeMc    
On a heartbreak map, you draw three layers, the things you love, the things that break your heart, and solutions. This is my heartbreak map.

                                        
As you can see, some of the things I love are Music, Human Rights movements, and the movement towards awareness of Mental Illness. I am very passionate about the human rights movement and would call myself a feminist. While I was going about making my heartbreak map, I was scared to put feminism as something I love and that got me thinking. The stigma around feminism is a prime example of the institutional sexism in today's society. If you ask many people what they think of feminism, they will describe a feminist as a men-hating pessimist, and while there are some feminist who are like that, the majority of the feminist population just want equality.  I think exploring into the stigma around feminists and the effect it has on society would be something I would be very interested in. I would like to give people the truth about gender equality and hopefully help to break the stigma.

Speaking of stigma's to break... another stigma that I would kill to break is the stigma around people with mental illness. Many times, people with mental illness are scared to get help because they think people will see them as crazy, and that is just ridiculous. About 25% of all people deal with mental illness themselves in their lifetime. I'm pretty sure that 25% of people aren't crazy. I would really like to get involved in spreading awareness of what mental illness actually is and to help break the stigma. So many people with mental illness go undiagnosed due to fear of judgement, and hundreds of thousands of people commit suicide each year. If people were more accepting of mental illness then lives would be saved.

The heartbreak map really helped me dissect things I am passionate about. I'm looking forward to digging deeper into these topics and really trying to make a difference in people's daily lives.