Shane Koyczan was bullied when he was a child. Children are cruel at times… without meaning to be.

To carry that pain, to ‘obey’ the perceptions of those whose world view is immature and miniscule, to shape your life with words used by those who had no idea of their power, to live out someone else’s faulty perceptions of what your limits are, IS WRONG. Countless children carry the scars of their childhood jeers in the hidden folds of their being. Most of them are unaware that they’ve internalized those words and that the words have become their blueprint for life. I cannot imagine a bigger waste.

To be limited by the words of someone who was wanton, cruel and mean, who knew what he was saying and still didn’t care, is bad enough. But to wear the shackles of the words of someone who had no idea what they were saying, nor how their words would impact you, is the saddest thing on earth.

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This is my reply to myself on those days when I will wake up and ask myself, “Am I stupid?” This is for those days when I will wonder why I bother to get up at all. This is my justification for those moments of hopelessness when I will ask myself whether there is any point. This will fill those hours which will slip by unnoticed and I’ll wonder where the time went. This is my answer to a silent scream within me which will rip me apart into untidy shreds. This is the voice of my defiance, stridently brash, vulgar in its loudness telling my demons to leave me alone. This is my reminder to myself. I am more than someone’s faulty perceptions of who I am.

I am an unlimited being; words do not define me.