Belief: An Indispensable Spice of Life

A teen in Blue Dragon’s program shares his story in his own words:

“I have been at Blue Dragon for 4 years. I am a student. Today, I bring you an indispensable spice of life, and it’s “Belief”.

Belief is an important value to me but is something hard to explain. To me, it means we trust ourselves, trust in others or believe in a better future. Without belief, we will be unable to reach our dreams.

In the past I lost all belief in my life.

I was born in a poor family. There are 6 people in my family: my parents, my 3 siblings and I. My dad had brain disease, and I have an impairment in my leg. Neighbors thought we did bad things in a past life as we were poor and suffered with these disabilities. Things did not stop there. They blamed us every time they lost something. So I lost faith in them.

I was also bullied many times by other kids, but no one protected me, even though I did not do anything wrong. This gave me the strong idea in my mind that “violence can change everything”. I started to fight with people, which made my parents upset. My friends and people in my community started staying away from me.

Due to discrimination from my friends and my family’s situation, I left my home to earn money at the age of 13. I did a lot of different work like shoeshining and working in food stalls. But I never got paid after all my hard work. With the shoeshining job, people competed and used violence to get customers. I quit working and continued wandering around. I totally lost belief in my future.

After wandering and living on the streets for a while, I met a Blue Dragon staff. I did not trust what they were doing at the beginning. But the patience, love, and respect from them have changed me. I went back to school and integrated with new friends there. I found love and respect from my family and neighbors. Blue Dragon helped me to change my point of view about life. Life is still beautiful.

Through my story, I want you to tell you that we can do everything if we have belief.”