Once a person checks into a shelter they have a choice to make. They can decide that they are going to make some life adjustments. They will take time to evaluate, “How did I get here?” An honest assessment can be very helpful. Many make a mental list of all of the people that have hurt them and continue to blame them throughout their stay. Something similar can happen to those in jail or prison. Some doing this evaluation begin to think, “Well that is just the way I am.” Neither of these options is particularly helpful. What is helpful is this honest inventory of the past. A person might examine their past and find some things that have not served them well. This would be like anger management issues, addiction or mental illness. When someone is honest, they might discover that there is some personal flaw that can be remedied like laziness or fear. During this time of evaluation, they can also learn that some of the issues that led to them being homeless are not their fault. This is true in situations where abuse was present in their lives. The abuse is not their fault. The poverty warrior will likely have to remind them of that many times. Others in the community will be casting blame on the victim. They will say they put themselves in that position by where they were or what they were wearing. That is totally bogus. There is NEVER an excuse for abuse.
With this baseline quickly put together. It is important to move quickly to their hopes and dreams. Hope is a powerful tool and if you can get their imagination to travel to an incredible future, the battle is mostly won. Again you are fighting against a history of missteps, perceived and real failures and a negative attitude. You, poverty warrior, are in this fight with them. Keep bringing this back to their vision.
While the vision is powerful, we must be truthful about obstacles and identify where they might have challenges. The challenges are part of the process to healing and growth. Most obstacles have some sort of way around them, over them or through them. Explore with them options. When plan A fails, no worry. Go to plan B, then C and so on until the dream becomes real.
The other option folks have when they show up at a shelter, jail or prison is to simply keep going on with what they have always done. This is working for them as some level. The drugs feel good, the credit card debt solved their problems before, it can do so again. A romantic relationship will make it ok. All of these short-term options point to the life of someone who has not hit rock bottom. They might say they have been at rock bottom. But a true rock bottom will cause a person to say that they will do whatever it takes to move forward in a better direction. That is where you should spend your resources.
