It was an awkward evening for me. I was polite but didn\u2019t really speak much in a room filled with young energy. I was just being really observant. It felt as though I didn\u2019t belong, or applied to the wrong program. It was Challenge Detroit\u2019s Interview Day. It was weird because I knew that no one in the room was really like me. I mean there were individuals who were young and innovative like me… but no one LIKE me. No one had experienced what I experienced. No one had been through the difficulties I had endured… like growing up in my grandmother\u2019s home of 10, where my sister and I had to share parents with 3 cousins who loss their parents to tragedy… or growing up playing video games on summer nights in the living room then suddenly hearing gun shots and bullets piercing the air outside the window, being forced to duck and lay flat on the floor until the gun shots ceased…
\nor growing up in a school system with a lack of sufficient resources and safety due to a school neighborhood vacant of love and security… i abhorred my laborious upbringing for a very long time… then I realized that I was Dillon because of what Dillon saw… I learned that differences make Beauty. & beauty is also the Challenge to accept in moments of pain…<\/p>\n
Challenge Detroit has given me the opportunity to really face my fear of emerging from unfamiliarity, making my Uncomfortable a strength. My experiences has lead me to wisdom which has been combined with individuals who have just as much. My cohort is family. What is happening, though?<\/p>\n
We\u2019ve accomplished so much so far due to our willingness to commit to a city that we\u2019re extremely passionate about.. different backgrounds.. but it didn\u2019t matter. The City was our common ground. I love my fellows. And Love has been the glue to our success. But why? Why am I suddenly willing to be so committed to a group of individuals who met me a few months back? Why am I willing to allow my passion to fuse with theirs? Why am I willing to share my experiences with individuals who could judge me? … its cause it\u2019s bigger than me. It\u2019s bigger than the Black boy from the Eastside who wakes up motivated to conquer. It\u2019s bigger than those bullets that were dodged in the living room of my grandmother\u2019s house. It\u2019s bigger than a household of 10 where poverty was present. It\u2019s bigger than a flawed school system. … but these moments aren\u2019t bigger than our potential..<\/p>\n
it\u2019s Love, Detroit… and there\u2019s so much more to do… not done..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It was an awkward evening for me. I was polite but didn\u2019t really speak much in a room filled with young energy. I was just being really observant. It felt as though I didn\u2019t belong, or applied to the wrong program. It was Challenge Detroit\u2019s Interview Day. It was weird because I knew that no […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25038","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25038","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25038"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25038\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25038"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25038"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25038"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}