Handed Over to the Bear's Den

This morning we are seven days deep into the backcountry of Glacier, carrying everything we need on our own two shoulders, tired in a way that reaches the bone. Before we left, I posted a poll asking how many bears we would see, and people worried. They let the fear of a bear question whether we should go at all. But here is what I keep sitting with out here. Yes, the bears are predators. They could harm us. But we came prepared, with the knowledge and the tools to protect ourselves from the very thing that could hurt us. Now picture a child in foster care who has none of that. Picture the ones who age out at eighteen, turned over to the bear's den with nothing. Every decision was made for them for years, and then one day we hand them a new reality and pretend some magic number made them ready. I look at my own eighteen year old, nowhere near ready, and yet we do this to these children every single day.

So let me talk about the power of one. There are more than three hundred million people in this country and fewer than four hundred thousand children in foster care. Even if half of us cannot give right now, that still leaves an enormous number of people who could each choose just one. Your one is the first rock thrown into the water, and that ripple becomes a wave, and a wave changes the whole landscape of the sand. What if you and ten friends wrapped around one child, or ten small businesses supported one foster home and the respite it so desperately needs? We get stuck in the too big and tell ourselves there is nothing we can do, so we do nothing. But that has never been true.

And if you are fighting your own battle right now, with addiction or mental health or the weight of your own story, then hear me, because what if the one is you? Six years ago I could not have dreamed of any of this. What made it possible was the slow, uncomfortable healing work of facing the beliefs I claimed as mine even though I never chose them. Fear is not a stop sign. Fear is evidence. Ashana, a former foster child I interviewed recently, said something I cannot shake. Hope meant you were not safe, so you never even reached for it. Imagine a childhood with no maybe someday, only can I get through today without being labeled, can I even want tomorrow to come. That is what we can change. So I will end the way I always do. I am not daring you to change the world. I am asking whether you have the courage to do it for one, and whether the fear standing in your way is the very thing worth looking at. Love you, mean it.

Learn more about Fostering the Summit here: http://www.fosteringthesummit.org

Contact Corree or find out more about Corree and learn about all the ways she does not choose to stay in one lane go here: https://correeroofener.com/

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Until next time, keep shining bright!

- Corree