Retreat FundRaiser Spotlight
Meet Janet Zahorsky!
Janet (she/they) attended their first LoveYourBrain Retreat this March in Colorado and has raised over $2,000 by telling their story and sharing their art!
We sat down with Janet to learn about their Retreat fundraiser, what inspired them, and what made it successful. We hope that you find inspiration from their story and the power of what Janet shared with us!
“I have learned to love and appreciate my brain in a completely different way over this last year. It’s given me a sense of freedom and peace.”
Tell us about your fundraiser! What made it so successful?
I wanted my fundraiser to feel like a celebration of my brain and all that LYB has brought to my life. I also wanted to honor LYB’s emphasis on community, knowing that I couldn’t be who I am without the support of many wonderful people. Describing how my TBI impacts my daily life has been something that’s been really difficult for me. Sharing my art – through “thank you gifts” for donors – felt like a way that I could share both my story and my love for the LYB community.
Quite literally, my TBI changed how I see the world between my vision and vestibular systems; and it figuratively changed how I see the world in how my brain processes information. Art has helped me to understand those differences better. I started making art about a year and a half ago when issues with my vestibular system flared.
Most of the art I make is a form of pointillism, where the image is made on paper with individual ink dots. This process mimics how my brain processes and reorganizes what my eyes see.
It started as a way to feel less dizzy/off-balance. On paper, I can see depth and dimension in ways that my brain struggles to process in real time. Slowly, I realized that my art allows me to express how I see and understand the world in a way that is made possible by my TBI.
Between this realization and LYB’s mindset program, I feel like I have learned to love and appreciate my brain in a completely different way over this last year. It’s given me a sense of freedom and peace. Each of the donor gifts represents a particular part of my journey. The t-shirt ($50 donation) is something I designed to represent my daily experience with my TBI. The pointillism prints ($100 donation) represent the depth and complexity of the brain; and my admiration for it. And the individualized, custom art pieces ($250 donation) represent collaboration and blending how my brain works with others’ stories.
What motivated your incredible fundraising efforts?
My efforts were motivated by gratitude for the LoveYourBrain Foundation, the Pearce Family, all of the people I’ve met through LYB, and for all of those who read my story and chose to donate. For me, the heart of LYB is centered around the bravery of the Pearce family as they shared Kevin’s and their story in The Crash Reel. Their story and efforts are an amazing example of how vulnerability leads to connection, connection leads to community, and community leads to healing. I hoped to embody that ethos in my fundraising. Hopefully, it will help create opportunities for more participants in the future!
What does being a part of the LYB community mean to you?
In the 15 years since I acquired my TBI, my body didn’t feel like my home anymore. Or at least, it was a home that I couldn’t really recognize. It was unfamiliar in ways I couldn’t always comprehend or explain, and that was a really isolating feeling. Since becoming part of the LYB community, I have a restored hope and excitement for my future. Between the tools offered in the Mindset program and the wonderful people I’ve connected with, being part of the LYB community feels like the whole neighborhood came over to help me restore my home. They helped me to make sense of the current blueprints, choose a new paint job, and see the beauty in what is already there. LYB has changed my life because I now have tools and a community that has helped me to feel at home in my body again. This community has given me a place to belong.
Tell us about your experience at the LYB Retreat…
Those 4 days helped to give me what felt like 15 years worth of healing and acceptance about my TBI. I feel like I left with lifelong connections. And I feel an inner peace that I didn’t know was possible. It felt like every portion of the event was so thought through in order to accommodate everyone’s brains and health. That was so empowering.
I can’t say enough how grateful I am for this experience and for all of the people who made it so memorable. I am excited to continue to apply what I’ve learned to my life!
We are so grateful to Janet, all of the wonderful humans joining our Retreats, and those supporting us to make this a free, supportive opportunity for our community!