Last week, I had the opportunity to attend the Sleep-out event where I got to listen to the stories of people who used to be in the homeless shelter in Ithaca. This experience was eye-opening to me since it allowed me to understand the perspectives of the homeless instead of assuming that their personal circumstances would not be relevant to me. One particular man, sung songs about how the hardships of poverty have given him experiences that have made him stronger and resilient to believe that he can change the world. Through this experience, I also understood that society’s misconceptions about the homeless such as assuming that many people do drugs, or that many people are homeless because their actions have led to them to that are unfair. I really evaluated how the homeless aren’t being heard and biases and pre-conceived notions can really prevent people from respecting the homeless. I have recently been reflecting a lot on how conforming to society’s expectations is exhausting and this experience proved that as well. Just because people don’t meet a certain standard of class based on their job, lifestyle etc does not mean that they do not have anything to offer. It made me affirmatively realize that my talents have been fostered due to my luck of upbringing and how many more lost talents could be fostered if all people had similar opportunities.

Overall, I thought that it was important to simulate the conditions that the homeless live because it gives a sharp taste of the reality of what other people are going through and really makes all the small challenges that overwhelm me at Cornell seem minimal. I think at times, it is better to experience the challenges of others in order to really understand what they are going through. I hope to experience something similar in the future as well in order to greater understand people in different scenarios and phases of life.