All that Easy, All that Hard: Cristhel’s Story

This photo is shared with permission by the author (left) who came to a Border Encounter in March of this year. The picture shows her family in 2016 in their home in Matagalpa, Nicaragua.

Sometimes, a single, tangible, undeniable experience plants a seed of doubt within us. And that’s when everything begins to change.

For me, this life-changing experience was an Abara Border Encounter. As an international student from Nicaragua, I thought I understood migration. When my dad was a teenager, almost his entire family emigrated to Costa Rica in search of better life opportunities, and he was the only one who decided to stay. I didn’t meet my family in Costa Rica until I was 18, so before that, I always thought of them as the ones who had left, a distant reality very different from my own.

I always wondered what would have happened if my dad had decided to go with them. I would have had a different life, a different family–what would my reality have been like? It wasn’t until I was older I learned the full story of their departure, their reasons, and how their lives had changed. This was my first experience with migration, through the lens of my family’s story.

A few years later, I moved  to the U.S. for college. I left everything I knew behind, started living life in another language, and was surrounded by new people and many cultures. There are days when I miss home and wonder what my life would have looked like if I had stayed. In some ways  I feel that  I have developed two distinct identities, one that belongs here and one back home. At times they overlap, mix until they become indistinguishable; other times I feel that I don’t belong anywhere. I thought I knew everything about migration, but what I experienced at the border encounter was something I couldn’t have even imagined. It completely turned my ideas upside down, and for that, I am grateful.

Shared with permission, Cristhel in Kindergarten in Matagalpa, Nicaragua, 2010

Disagreement is among the highest forms of human communication. Some scholars, like Nahman of Breslov, believe that God’s creation of the cosmos could actually be replicated by humans engaging in spirited conversation. Before the encounter, I disagreed with the idea that listening to understand others would have an effect on reaching a consensus. I used to think that even when we try to walk in someone else’s shoes, we are still wearing our own. However, after our multiple conversations at Abara, I realized that words build up narratives. Words are more important than I thought. 

When our ideas are challenged, there are two possible outcomes: We reaffirm our previously held beliefs or we find the limitations in them.

After the three-day-long border encounter, I met with my peers to reflect on the sessions and our visit to a migrant shelter in Juárez.  We all agreed that our understanding of immigration and border dynamics had changed after the encounter. Migrant stories humanized immigration for us. For example, although I was familiar with my own family’s story of migration, when I saw people migrating through Nicaragua, I didn’t think about the stories, motives, and complexities behind their faces. I unintentionally saw them as individuals in a certain situation and perceived them as having a fixed identity.

When we learned about dignified storytelling at La Hacienda, I was deeply moved by the realization that empathy is not easy. We often create a circle of empathy that is exclusive. Yet empathy is our most important currency as human beings.

Personally, empathy feels more natural with people I love. Understanding just seems to flow. When it comes to people I hold no feelings for, and even those with whom I may have had disagreements in the past, empathy doesn’t arise in the same way. It requires a conscious decision.

Even if we can never fully understand someone’s story, we can still choose to empathize. Privilege can blind us, and it is easy to assume that we understand everything. Gratitude and empathy should guide every decision we make.

Silence can be loud. After the encounter, one of my peers mentioned that they now felt responsible for speaking up. Throughout the sessions, I was afraid of forgetting about the experience. We would soon go back home, to our regular routines, and it is easy to get lost in the ordinary. Moreover, it is sometimes easier to walk away. However, the seed of doubt planted in my heart has not left me for a second. This has impacted my understanding of the  dynamics in my relationships, and I now attempt to prioritize understanding before being understood.

In the rush of our lives, what a privilege it is to slow down and acknowledge the agency we possess through our voice, our greatest power. Let’s use our voices to change the narrative, even if it’s our own narrative. Yes, it is all that easy. And it is all that hard.

Cristhel Mejía, Border Encounter Participant