Tuesday, November 5, 2013

The F-You Project Book Launch

Sometimes words just aren’t enough. On rare occasions, there are just no words to define a moment, a memory or an emotion. But for 22 Canadian youth who found the right words, they were able to heal and capture a moment of clarity by sharing their stories of forgiveness in the F-You Project: The Forgiveness Project – Memories of Violence and Compassion book, which launched September 5 at Toronto’s 918 Bathurst, Culture, Arts, Media and Education Centre.
“I was told once that sharing stories is probably one of the most intimate and giving experiences that you can do, because it is giving a piece of you. That requires a lot of courage and we want to commend everybody for their courage tonight,” says Wan Luv, the event’s host, who spoke to a packed room of supporters of the book’s various authors and founder Tara Muldoon, who began the F-You movement three years ago in spite of her own journey of forgiveness through personal trauma.
“This has been a dream come true both for myself and for the writers,” an emotional Muldoon shared. “I think it says a lot about us as a generation and who we are as people that we’re here celebrating a book on forgiveness… I wanted to make sure that if we are glamourizing certain things, that we are also having a conversation about the repercussions.”
At the launch, many of the writers presented their pieces by taking everyone in the room on an emotional journey together as they shared testimonies of personal reflection and readings from the book.
Canadian hip-hop artist L The 12th Letter shared with the audience that he had turned Muldoon down multiple times when asked to contribute to the book, before finally submitting his beautifully written piece, “Words”, on the last day of deadline. Toronto writer Jonathon “Bizz” Brown broke down while reading his emotional story titled, “SeeSaw of Support” where he spoke on intimate details about his family life that left an emotional blanket of support throughout the building as the room sat quiet, just listening to a man sharing his reality.
Contributing writer Sahar Talebi spoke about her written piece titled “Barrel Of The Gun” with a moving speech, touching everyone in the room with her genuine words. “To me, forgiveness is more than just a process where you eradicate these feelings of rage and anger and move on from whatever the issue may have been as a result of time. To me, it’s an amazingly complex, extraordinary act of super natural, where you’re actually able to feel the tangible side of what it means to be involved in something that might be so horrific,” Talebi shared before stating that we are all worthy to forgive and move on.
After receiving a signed letter from the mayor’s office, Muldoon announced that this is just the first book of many, and that she is already accepting submissions for the next instalment on grief, which she hopes to have out in the New Year.

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