All around the world, people have become homeless due to a variety of cruel factors: losing jobs, a broken home life, or even being born into it.

The problem is a complex issue that we’re not here to solve, but we can shed a little light on what a life lived on the streets feels like.

Gregory P Smith, who had been homeless for 25 years, penned an insightful article for The Guardian. In it, Smith recalls how he hit rock-bottom, and how it affected him for a quarter of a century:

After a childhood blighted by domestic violence, and traumatic years in an orphanage and juvenile detention, my homeless life played out right up and down the eastern seaboard of Australia for a quarter of a century.

Hamstrung by scant education, I scratched out a pathetic existence in the gutters of Darlinghurst, Kings Cross and Surry Hills in Sydney, and in the back lanes of inner-Brisbane…

Homeless life is a hard, hard slog. You’re always hungry, you’re always tired and society always thinks the worst of you. I used drugs and alcohol to self-medicate against my mental illness, which no doubt caused people to write me off as a drunken bum who chose a bottle over a better life.

But the life I lived is one no one in their right mind would ever choose. Homelessness can, in fact, feel like a waking nightmare.

From routinely being beaten by the police and civilian patrols to feeling “blanked” by passersby, Smith saw society as a whole as “reinforcers of my feelings of shame and self-disgust”.

These feelings worsened to the point that, in 1990 – after 15 years of living it out in public restrooms and train stations – Smith walked right into a rainforest on the north coast, and stayed there for 10 years.

He has detailed his hermetic lifestyle in his new book Out of the Forest:

However, his life in the forest only got worse:

During the crazy and chaotic years I lived in the forest, my health – both physical and mental – steadily degraded to the point that I knew I would die if I stayed there.

Eventually, Smith emerged around 2000, and he decided to give society a chance again by “being the best version of myself as possible”:

As much as there was a tendency for people to avoid the homeless, I realised I had been pushing the world away from me, too. In letting my guard down a little, I allowed people to come into my life.

It’s heartwarming to know that Smith’s life has turned around somewhat, but it doesn’t hide the fact that there are other people who are floating in the same boat.

When he was asked what one must do when coming across a homeless person, Smith replied:

Maybe you cannot make a difference to that person’s circumstance, but you can make a difference to how you see them. Many are hurting with the shame and stigma of being homeless. Don’t pretend they don’t exist: they are people, too.

It’s a profound article that makes for good reading, not to mention our thinking towards homeless people.

Check out Smith’s full piece here.

[source:guardian]