The Boys Next Door

The Boys Next Door is a really touching story about adults with mental disorders. When I first began the book, I did not realize it was going to be about adults with mental disorders. But as the play went on, I began to pick up on the characters identities. However, I felt like it was a bit overdone: the direction of the play and the interaction of the characters. It is a humorous play without poking fun at the characters life situations. But I feel like I could not complete feel the impact of their lives…the character’s lives.

I really enjoyed visiting the alliance for independence group home. The tour helped reveal the hearts of the residences and of the employers. People with mental disorders are no different then us. We all have different weaknesses in our lives. I feel, in regards to the mentally handicap, we often say we should treat them like children and stuff around those lines. But then I feel like we plant that mentality in our minds that we try so hard not to treat people with mental disorders differently that we unintentionally still do. Does that even make sense?

I feel like in order to sincerely treat the mentally disabled at a neutral level, we must evaluate the motives of our heart. Are we trying to them equally because we sincerely have a desire to care or because we know we should have a desire to care?

I did not mean to go off on some random rant about this. It was just what was on my heart. But questioning our motives are important I feel like. Our motives heavily reflect the way we live our lives. And often, people do not see if you are sincere or not…so there is no accountability. Let us not live lives were we do the right thing or treat people the right way because we know we should. Let us strive for hearts with pure motives that it naturally flows from us to treat people equally.