We Are Detroit

Hello. My Name is Lauren LoGrasso. I grew up in the suburbs of Detroit. As a kid I felt disconnected from the city, but now, in my adulthood, and ironically, after moving across the country, I feel I finally understand. I feel I am finally connected to the city. I am ride or die for Detroit. Why? Because I am Detroit. So are you. I’ll explain further in a bit, but first let me state some background: I live in Los Angeles and get to travel a lot for work, and I seem to come across a lot of people, with a lot of opinions about a place they have never visited. I am constantly being put in a position to defend Detroit. Usually I can handle it well, and move with grace, but I do get really upset when people relentlessly say bad things against Detroit like they have some sort of personal beef with the city. Somehow Detroit has become America's punching bag. I'm not naive. I understand that the city is not in a great place and that a lot of changes need to be made, but I see and feel great hope: a hope that I’m not sure you can fully understand until you visit.

What really inspired me to start writing on the subject was when I saw what Fox in Tampa Bay wrote about the  David Price trade to the Tigers last month. It made me burn. I felt personally attacked. I think I am finally starting to understand why I feel this way when I see Detroit relentlessly criticized.  I know why hearing people constantly shit all over a city that is already down over and over and over again is eating me alive. For one thing: If Detroit had a dollar for every time someone complained about or belittled it, we would never have gone bankrupt. So my first thought is, why not do something about it? If you think Detroit is terrible and you are that concerned with the way it looks, and the way people who reside there are living, then get off your ass and make a change. That’s my first thought. 

My second thought, that I mentioned earlier, is that I am Detroit and so are you. What I mean is: we all run the risk of making a few bad judgments, trusting one too many bad people who promise they will help, and, therefore, falling down a slippery slope. None of us are so powerful that we are invulnerable to demise, and, with that said, none of us are so ravaged that we are beyond repair. There is a little Detroit in all of us. It’s also the city that raised my parents, who raised me…So when you say something disparaging about it, it almost feels like you’re insulting my ailing grandmother, who has a great chance for recovery, who you've also never met. 

Which brings me to my third thought: most people who have BIG, HUGE opinions on Detroit have either 1) Never been there or 2) Never lived there/in the surrounding areas. Now if you've lived there and have a bad opinion of it, fine, that’s your experience, feel free to share. But to me, the way people talk about the city is like saying, “I’ve never tried ice cream, but I’m pretty sure every flavor is terrible, and the ice cream industry, as a whole, is going down hill.” I understand that wasn't the best comparison, but stick with me… YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO HAVE AN OPINION ABOUT SOMETHING, SOMEONE OR SOMEWHERE YOU HAVE NEVER EXPERIENCED. Period. 

So STFU, Haters... Back to writing like an adult: you can’t have an opinion about the city if you've never been there, and you CERTAINLY cannot say that the whole city is done for. Have you been to the DIA, Tigers Stadium, Slows Barbecue, Campus Martius, basically all of Midtown, Eastern Market, Corktown and Greektown, just to name a few? No, I’ll bet you haven’t. Have you seen or heard the incredible art that is being created in the city? No, again, right? How about all of the delicious restaurants and innovative business that are cropping up all over town? I guess it's probably safe to go with a final, no. Clearly it’s more fun for you to focus on ruin porn and abandoned houses. Please bear in mind, little, if any, good has ever come on focusing on destruction. 

It’s upon focusing on the positives that already exist and envisioning the good to come, that true change is made. So I beg of you, before you share your negative opinion on Detroit, don’t. Try to say something positive. Even if it’s just, “I really hope your city makes it out of this”, I promise people from the city and Metro Detroit area, alike will appreciate it. Because wouldn't you want someone to try to bandage you up instead of kicking you in the gut after you had been injured? I think so. Remember, you are Detroit, so treat the city the way you’d like to be treated.

Give Me Authenticity Or Give Me Death

Betrayal of oneself is possibly the most egregious spiritual crime. If you are willing to forsake your own soul for the sake of any seeming reward, then you have no chance whatsoever of being true to someone else. You cannot possibly see the road to happiness and fulfillment when you are focused on other's opinions and how to make your outward self more appealing. This need for outward validation is why we generally betray ourselves, right? We think: "I don't really want to do this", our intuition says, "this isn't right", but we go forth anyway, because we are worried about other's opinions and how we might look.

Why do we do this? In my own life, I have often betrayed my soul because I thought, "What will people say if I don't do this?" "Won't I be ashamed?", "Will I feel like a failure if I don't have monetary success?". The preceding questions exemplify the ego at its worst and most perilous state.

I have come to realize something: There is no greater shame than lacking the courage to follow your heart. Nothing is beneath me except being false to myself. That is far beneath me. And I hope it is beneath you too. There is no way we can possibly, respect, support, trust and love each other if we cannot do that for ourselves. All we leave this world with are our connections to each other: how we made each other feel and how well we loved. That is the only damn thing in this whole world that remains. Why take away this great spiritual gift?

I think about this in particular in regard to the feeling of shame society can bestow upon us for not having a high profile job. I really wish money didn't exist. I wish we could all be a bunch of hippies running around bartering, and focusing on following our souls. However, since it does, and since we live in a capitalistic culture we need to find a way to be validated by spiritual wealth instead of the fleeting physical wealth. 

I know that if I had taken the "Natural Track" I could have a really nice, high-paying job, sitting in an office somewhere while my soul slowly withered alway along with my self-respect and passion for life. I would rather scrape around the world for years, going from vagabond job to vagabond job that surrender my soul to an institution I don't believe in. I know I will have success in the arts I am pursuing because I am doing it with absolute integrity and soul. Passion does not even begin to describe the way I feel about the messages I put forth through singing, writing, acting and teaching. Even if I end up in a place that's different from what I envisioned, I am one hundred percent sure that if I go forth with an open, honest heart, and with respect and honor for my deepest self, I will prevail.

Give me Authenticity or give me death! Really, if you aren't real with yourself, your happiness, light and love die. So while it sounds like an extreme statement, it's actually quite true. The only way we will find our path to enlightenment and love, lies within ourselves, not in anything physical we can conceive. So I challenge you all, as I challenge myself to focus on what's within: Nourish your inner self. Respect the being you came here to be. And for God's sake, be authentic. Everyone can smell a phony coming from a mile away and it's not too attractive. I really believe all the world's deepest issues start in self betrayal, so starting today, I ask you to be faithful to your soul. I can't wait to see the positive influence your honest and trustworthy self will have on the world!

Love,

Lo :)