It’s often said that the lotus represents beauty and growth. A perfect analogy for many of us, the lotus represents how even when its roots are in the murkiest waters, it produces the most beautiful flower.
We as Asian Americans are in murky waters now. The shame and stigma in Asian American communities makes us report some of the highest levels of mental distress, while being 3 times less likely than white people to seek help. It’s time to blossom. It’s time to beat the stats.
Why?
Mental health is just as important as physical health. Just like physical health, your mental health can lie on a wide spectrum of wellness. While all communities care for mental health and face mental health problems, Asian Americans often deal with community-specific problems that exacerbate the issue leading to these shocking statistics.
Our Mission:
Project Lotus destigmatizes mental health in Asian-American communities by tackling the model minority stereotype through culturally-relevant education for the community and the empowerment of voices.
Project Lotus advances the movement for Asian Americans to be able to discuss, care for, and advocate mental health freely, without shame or stigma.
Why the Model Minority Stereotype?
This stereotype imposes a toxic narrative of success on our community. Our Asian American kids are supposed to be math whizzes, musical geniuses, and our adult generation is expected to be successful STEM and medical workers (but not leaders).
While some members of our community may fit this “mold”, it sounds ridiculous to box in every Asian American, and it affects us from both within the Asian American community and out. We get stereotyped by others by the combination of ideas like being innately successful and hardworking as well as often being seen as foreigners. Within our community, the stereotype affects us when members start to conform. Tiger parenting and academic pressure are often prevalent within our community due to many factors such as culture and the model minority myth.
The problem is, this stereotype doesn’t account for the diversity in our community. What about the kid who isn’t a math whiz, the college student who doesn’t go to the top university, and the parent who chose a career field other Asians don’t? These things would usually be considered normal, but the model minority myth forces differences to be considered deviation from a stereotype non Asian Americans and Asian Americans have slowly adopted.
We at Project Lotus believe this myth is the root cause of many community-specific mental health problems. The myth puts mental health below our priorities, and when a community member does face mental health problems, its perceived as shocking that someone could have such issues. The shame and stigma make these problems seem taboo, as if they couldn’t possibly affect us. Furthermore, the model minority myth contributes towards the prejudice and discrimination we face, adding to the many factors affecting our mental health. Lastly, things like culture, immigration, language barriers, the healthcare system, and survivor mentality, along with the model minority myth, are all factors that made mental health something that needs to be prioritized more in Asian American communities.
It may put unnecessary stress on children, students, and parents who are different from the stereotype, all while making it difficult to seek help.
We understand what it means to be Asian American. The stress the model minority myth puts on us, the tug of cultures, and the prejudice we face.
We also understand the pride of being Asian American. The rich culture, sense of community, and uniqueness us Asian Americans have is what makes us so diverse.
Through Project Lotus we can advance a mental health movement that is relevant to Asian Americans. We can fight the stigma, educate one another, and provide accessible and culturally-relevant resources to foster a sustainable, supportive community.
We hope those of you who support our movement can join us in blossoming the community.
