This is Lore, I was born on november 11th, 1995 in Samaipata, a town of Santa Cruz-Bolivia, my family was dedicated to agriculture, thanks to this I had a lot of contact with nature. I lived in Samaipata until I was 9 years old, when we moved to Spain, for financial reasons. In Spain I continued primary school and in secondary school I was interested in literature, math and arts.
When I was 15 years old I returned to Bolivia due to family problems, for me it was a very tough situation since I was related to the culture and lifestyle of the Spanish residents and it was very difficult for me to adapt to my new context since I started living in the city of Santa Cruz. As a teenager I refused to adapt for a long time, besides that I did not understand people, because the pattern of behavior was very different, Spanish society is individualistic, unlike Bolivian society is community. Years later after paying attention to a psychology book I understood that culture, context, personality and personal experiences among others determine how people can be and this helped me to understand the pattern of behavior of my new context and to adapt faster. One thing that helped me a lot in this adaptation was doing different sports such as athletics, swimming and doing extracurricular activities, so these activities helped me to develop physical, social, and psychological skills.
At the age of 19 I graduated from high school and chose to study psychology. Upon entering university, I discovered the range of possibilities to work with psychology and the different psychological, philosophical and scientific currents that comprise it.
In 2018, I left competitive sports and won a research grant and at the same time I started working as a swimming teacher. My students were the best way to get to know the theory applied in the real world. I worked with children, adolescents and adults. Months after leaving the sport as a daily activity, I felt a lot of pressure and anguish, my performance in the university faltered, and I presented depression. I had therapy for a year and also decided to take occupational therapy. I started attending spontaneous theater classes, which helped me a lot in the speaking and corporal expression of emotions.
I kept working in the science area, I participated for two years in Bolivian Science Clubs and in 2019 I received an offer to work in “Tu Ciencia Joven”, an organization created by youth people that were interested in science. As the coordinator of the social area I did several workshops for personal development with people from 15 to 23 years old.
In mid 2019, my dad passed away and at that moment I didn’t realize that I got into a major depression. I became more sensitive, irritable and in some moments I felt that I lost the sense of life. Losing a parent creates instability and takes confidence away from you. \
A month earlier I had applied for an intercultural exchange program to which they accepted me.
In Bolivia there was a 21 day national strike, where people took to the streets to protest. With the “Teatro espontaneo ecos” we decided to make performances at the blocking points, where we could show through acting stories and emotions that people were having at that time. What I lived in those days was enriching, being able to show those emotions and stories through my body and voice was like being dressed up as a united nation and having a strong connection with my society.
With the quarantine I lived a similar experience but this time in the virtuality from our homes, we did weekly performances that helped us to be able to go through that difficult time. From my perspective, the quarantine saved my life, it pushed me to live again in my mom’s house, she offered me a warm house and care; after my father died my relationship with my family was broken and being back at home helped us to rebuilt it; on the other hand it helped me to improve my mental health by having a working out routine, daily readings and the plays/performances, which didn’t last too long after the quarantine was over because I had to go back to work.
And finally after a long wait, I started the cultural exchange program and in mid 2021 I flew to Virginia, USA. By being here I recovered the sense of life and started being interested in buddhism, oriental philosophy, emotional intelligence, cognitive restructuring techniques, mindfulness and compassion. College is still not my main focus. I resumed my life purpose that is to create a shelter for youth people to support them in personal development, where besides just being a shelter, it is going to be a place where we’re going to have experiential workshops of different topics, in addition to that, I wish to become a conferencist and give workshops. I am interested again in literature and my aspiration this year is to write my first book, to have English as my second language, to work as a volunteer in an NGO and the most important thing, to take care of myself.