As a child in Hong Kong, my nanny told me stories of Quan Yin, and these stories made me realize gender was fluid, and gave me hope that one day I would be the woman I always wanted to be.
Unfortunately, I went through years on an emotional roller coaster ride that was more down than up. I was a depressed teenager, hating the person I saw in the mirror, and continually attempting to hurt myself. I hid in a world of drugs to make my reality more bearable. At 23, I jumped from a four-story building and landed in the hospital for 6 months. My family thought I was rebellious; they couldn’t see I needed help and wasn’t able to articulate the pain I felt inside for being unable to live my life as I needed to. When I finally decided to start living as a woman I discovered I was HIV positive. I continued my self-destructive ways, and besides my self-inflicted torments, I was attacked and stabbed—yet I still remained alive.
In 1995 I reincarnated myself, leaving the life of drugs behind. I learned to live my life instead of looking for ways to destroy it. It has been a long journey that in the end led me to dealing with my own truth, and to the woman my nanny had always told me about—Quan Yin, who observes all the crying of the world. Today, as a commissioner of the Human Rights Commission, I am able to listen to the crying of the world and try to change it. —Cecilia, 40
The goddess Quan Yin went through
ten incarnations - nine as a man -
before she became a woman.
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