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Allow me to launch this brand new blog with an unusual disclaimer: What appears in this space is part of my ongoing recovery.
Actually… that’s the whole point--the very concept upon which this blog is built.
Twenty years ago, I nearly lost everything to severe OCD. The disorder’s grip on me was overwhelming. I was fortunate to find my way to proper treatment, but still I stumbled along on my road to recovery. I needed something more--something to get and keep me motivated. And that something proved to be service to others with OCD. The more I shared my story, and the more I reached out to others in the OCD community, the stronger I got.
Through my outreach, meantime, I began networking with a wide variety of remarkable individuals who had turned their particular adversities into service to others facing challenges similar to their own. I quickly discovered that, regardless of the adversity--cancer, addiction, depression, or so many others--those who had found a way to be of service to others with their challenge had reaped powerful rewards. Fascinated by this adversity to advocacy process (and the "Greater Good motivation" it provides), I began delving into the concept. What I learned was that a growing body of empirical research exists supporting the very phenomenon that I and so many other adversity-driven advocates were experiencing--namely, that we help ourselves by helping others.
In 2011, I co-founded the nonprofit Adversity 2 Advocacy Alliance, aiming to showcase and foster the unique power of turning personal challenges into service to others with similar challenges. Through this project, I have been fortunate to meet the most amazing and courageous individuals who have committed their lives to adversity-driven advocacy. At the same time, I have interviewed and gotten to know some of the nation’s leading researchers--at U.C. Berkeley, Harvard, Stanford, and elsewhere—who are exploring through their research how we help ourselves by helping others.
With this blog post, I am thrilled to take my outreach to a whole new level, sharing both inspiring “adversity-to-advocacy” stories and cutting edge “resilience science” with online readers of Psychology Today, and I am extremely grateful to the editors of PT for this wonderful opportunity.
I invite you to get a feel for some of these stories and research projects through the A2A website, and specifically our weekly podcast conversations. In coming weeks, I will be sharing much more about these individuals and so many others like them who are forging paths for the rest of us to follow.
Thank you in advance for joining me on this journey AND for helping me further my own recovery!
Gratefully yours,
- jeff
