My 2022 Resolution

Sometimes I wonder about the way I come across online. I'd say it's hard not to, when so much of who I am, my thoughts, feelings, and time, is poured into a public platform. I believe I'm the same Cass in every area of my life, and that's a person who certainly alienates some people sometimes. I've had to come to terms with that all my life. Things like "Sass with Cass" and "Tell us how you really feel!" are born of my honest ways of interacting with the world. I don't sugar coat anything, really ever. Even when I'm trying to be tactful, occasionally I'm brutal.

That might be a result of what I have, this year, realized about myself: I'm on the autism spectrum. So much of me makes more sense now that I know that, and this year has definitely been a year of self discovery. Apart from that revelation--or maybe not apart at all since everything comes together in the person that is me--was a discovery of who I was here for.

When I'm online, when I'm public, when I'm writing, who is my audience?

It's no coincidence I'm prepping lessons on audience and voice for my 6th graders when we come back to school, but all that lesson planning started to ring true for me as well. I've said for a long time, when I discussed branding with a trusted friend, when I chatted about ideas, or vented frustrations, that I am definitely not here for everyone. There are people out there who seek to change the minds of people who disagree completely. That is incredibly noble, but it isn't my calling, at least not now. I thought for a long time my calling here was to help educate, broaden, and embolden people with whom I already shared a foundation. I've gotten so many messages talking about how they felt encouraged to think deeper, how they felt braver in voicing criticism, how they learned something more about a topic they were interested in. And I still want to do that. I'm an educator, and information and learning are my deepest joys. But I have learned I have a calling even closer to my heart than that.

I'm hear to speak for those who can't.

A message that changed my life was when a woman told me that she was a rape survivor, but didn't feel comfortable speaking about it because she felt she'd be attacked online. But she wanted me to know, because I was speaking up. I was defending her when I hadn't even known I was. That was an eye-opener. Then I received two more similar messages later.

I was told by another woman that my posts about domestic abuse and gaslighting helped her realize those aspects in her own marriage, helped her get over guilt and internalization she was feeling. I have rarely been prouder of my work than when I received those messages. This, I realized, is what I'm here for. This is why I refuse to be anything but loud, because there are people who can't be yet.

This is why I have always refused to let an instance go, why I don’t and won’t stop harping on the same topics. Because they come up over and over again, and the people who have experienced those deserve to feel supported every time. They deserve to not be ignored or ostracized. They deserve to not be blamed, even through fiction. Not everyone is called to be loud, but I am. I want the people who have been hurt and abused, the marginalized communities, the people who walk into a space and aren't sure if they'll be welcome, to know they're welcome here.

I don't talk much about my religious beliefs, but I do have a deep, personal relationship with Jesus. He is my role model as well as my savior. He is the one who took everyone at the fringes of society, the tax collectors and sex workers, the widows and orphans, the marginalized and voiceless, and called them His. I strive for a small sliver of that love. And that is my calling, to emulate the One who saved me.

This isn't a religious lecture, but I do want anyone who is frightened of or has been burned by religion to know that Jesus isn't religion. God is love. For me, the love I have been given I want to send outward. I want to use the privileges I've been given to help others, and I want to keep getting better. I hope to encourage people to find their voice, to give them space to express themselves, and to keep speaking up for those who can't.

That's my New Year's Resolution for 2022.