Fortunate to Be Part of This Simple but Profoundly Effective Work
At the time I joined RC, I had been diagnosed as “clinically depressed.” I was so depressed I couldn’t get out of bed for months. I saw expensive therapists and was advised to take psychiatric drugs. I was a film school graduate, but I had given up on filmmaking. I had no social life other than whatever co-dependent relationship I would get into with a boyfriend. I was so shy that drinking alcohol felt like the only way I could be around people. I was estranged from my immediate family and didn’t tell them what my life was like.
When I joined RC, I was guarded and suspicious of everyone involved. However, I quickly saw what happened when I was listened to and when I got to cry about my childhood as the daughter of a Holocaust survivor.
It’s now twenty-five years later. I’m the writer-director of award-winning and critically acclaimed films. The peer support I’ve received in RC made it possible for me to pursue my dreams as an artist.
Even more exciting is the fact that I learned how to support other artists. In 2006 I founded “The Independent Film School.” I have thousands of readers. Hundreds of matriculated students join me each year. I regularly receive e-mails from people I’ve never met who thank me for changing their lives by helping them reclaim hope, find their confidence, and learn how to build networks of support around themselves. I’m able to do this for thousands of artists because of the help that I receive in RC.
I also have a rich social life (without drinking) and a loving husband, and I’m now close to my siblings and parents.
I’m fortunate to be a part of this simple but profoundly effective work. I can only imagine the world we would live in if every human got this much support and this big a chance to heal from old hurts and regain confidence in their mind.
USA
(Present Time 205, October 2021)