Collective Narration: Loss
Grief if Isolating. But it doesn't have to be.
“Collective Narration: Loss” was an social experiment that was launched 3 years through Indiegogo after my dad suddenly passed away from cancer. The goal was to aggregate as many of stories of loss as possible into an ongoing ledger to create one narrative that is easily sorted by category, type, tone, or cause.
Almost 3 years ago my Dad passed away from renal cancer. When they found the cancer it was in his lungs, his liver, his brain, and his bones. He was diagnosed in January 2015 and gone by July of the same year. I didn't know how to deal with the grief, so I picked up writing again.
It was incredibly healing to pull those thoughts out of my head and onto paper and while writing and speaking with people about my experiences, I realized that no one is alone in their grief. As I read other's stories, I found that I could relate to someone else's story or the person I least expect relates to mine. Loss is not unique to anyone, but everyone’s experience of loss is unique to them. That's the beauty [and ugly] of loss, no matter who you are or where you come from, eventually we can all relate.
The reality is, every single person on this planet will have to face the loss of someone close at least once in our lives, if we don’t go first. This is because we are all part of a larger narrative of experience that is the human experience. I wanted to tap into that narrative with this campaign.
So How Did It Work?
I created a blog, collectivenarration.com.
Anyone could submit anonymously or not, either text or a single .jpeg image. Eventually this would become a database of shared stories of loss over time.
Anyone who submitted would always maintain the rights to their own stories and images.
The Impact
We live in a time where we have created isolated communities. This was meant to be a community that bridged those silos.
Think of the human experience as one long book, we are all part of a larger collective narrative. The question is not what narrative are you living, but really what page of it are you on?
Share your soul, through your grieving. You have no idea who you may impact with your words... someone else who may have needed to hear those words.