Wilo's Journal

What do I want out of helping someone to hear? After making the music video, it became very clear that I needed to make this my cause. Helping people has always been a strong part of who I am.

I want to bridge the gap between the hearing and non-hearing worlds.

I want to help the hearing world become better at understanding hearing loss, what it really means. Help them to more easily identify the times when they are possibly talking with someone who has some level of hearing loss. Help the hearing world learn more about communicating with someone who does have some level of hearing loss and that communicating is not really that more complicated. I want to help the hearing world integrate things like sign language into their everyday life so that even a little sign like thank you or I love you can make the most powerful difference to both worlds. I want to help the hearing world understand that the only difference between the hearing and non-hearing is hearing; otherwise, we're the same people. 

I want to help the non-hearing, hearing impaired, and slight hearing loss world to help others to communicate better with them by teaching others the cute and fun signs. I want to help the non-hearing world to show the hearing that communicating is actually easy if we both try something a little bit different. Maybe being different is helping to make communicating fun. I want to help the non-hearing world to hear the movies, hear music - their favorite songs, to hear their new baby cry for the first time ... to do and hear all the things that we in the hearing world take for granted. I want to help the hearing to feel like the only difference between our two worlds is the hearing.

The outcome is easy. If in a few years from now, I have helped to bridge the gap between those in the hearing and non-hearing worlds, then I will feel satisfied that the seed is planted and the culture will take care of the rest. I believe that there will always be some differences to work out in our worlds, but hopefully over time, our two worlds live as one.

So how do I make this outcome happen? I will plant the seed through my fund raising campaign. My fund raising organization will support those groups and causes that do things to change things between the hearing and non-hearing worlds in a positive way that helps to bridge the gap, so that the only difference is the hearing. By helping organizations to raise funds and by contributing to other fund raising campaigns and organizations, I personally and my organization will have helped change the world.

The only difference should be the hearing. Science will eventually solve the hearing loss problem. And when it does, then there will be a different difference between two different worlds. It's all about helping.