From Suicide Attempt Survivor to Oscar Winner!

Sunday night at the 87th Academy Awards, first time Oscar award winner for Adapted Screenplay, Graham Moore gave the most dramatic speech. He publicly announced that he had tried to kill himself at the age of 16 and urged everyone to stay weird and different.

Graham said,”When I was 16 years old, I tried to kill myself because I felt weird, and I felt different, and I felt like I did not belong. And, now I’m standing here. So, I would like this moment to be for that kid out there who feels like she’s weird, or she’s different, or she feels like she doesn’t fit in anywhere. Yes, you do. I promise you do. Stay weird. Stay different. And, then when it’s your turn, and you are standing on this stage, please pass the same message to the next person who comes along.”

When I was growing up I was called weird, was told I had weird friends and was picked on, but I had a saying, “Weird friends are the fun of life!” 

I’m touched to see more people coming forward, sharing their struggles and taking the stigma away from talking about suicide. I’m more thrilled to hear stories like Grahams’. Tales of people who choose life and just rock it out.

I am glad we are all still here. For this to be in the news as my book Still Here: How to Succeed in Life After Failing At Suicide is released feels like such powerful synchronicity to me.

By the way, Graham Moore won the Oscar for, The Imitation Game, which is a great movie and well worth seeing if you haven’t. I’ve watched it twice myself. Graham even wrote a line of dialogue in the movie the was very much of the same spirit as his speech, “it’s the very people who no one imagines anything of who do the things no one can imagine.” Indeed.