Review 6: "Love Letters to Strangers" by Hannah Brencher

Originally, I chose this talk not because of the fact that it's only five minutes (that was an added perk), but because I was really intrigued. I thought that the whole idea of writing love letters to strangers sounded confusing, but was also kind of novel. So, to sum it up, I went in to this talk looking for something that wasn't too in-depth, but sort of a basic structure about whatever this 'writing love letters to strangers' thing was.
Although this talk was short, it was really powerful. Hannah Brencher first describes how her mother used to send her letters in college rather than texts or electronic messages. She then goes in to, after she moved to New York City, how she was 'sucker-punched in the face by depression', and started sending out letters similar to those from her mother across the city. This movement apparently gained steam quickly, as people across the country began sending Brencher 'love letters'. Brencher then goes into examples of how this movement was implemented in other situations, such as on a college campus in Iowa. The most powerful example for me was when Brencher mentions a man who had planned to commit suicide. After saying goodbye to his loved ones via Facebook, the man was flooded with love letters, and he eventually decided not to kill himself because of the kindheartedness of others.
Personally, I feel like we should do this at some point during the school year. If we just placed random letters of kindness around the school, it would make each of us comparable to Johnny Barnes. I feel like there's a lot of negativity and discord in our class, and I really think that writing these random love letters and placing them on campus could really unite us and make us all feel better about ourselves. That's just my opinion, though. If you do happen to comment on this post, please communicate if you think this is a good idea for the future.
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Link to Brencher's talk