My life has been kind of colorful. I've had a lot of adventures, from exploring the hallways of an abandoned factory as an urban explorer to wandering around the country by Greyhound for six weeks as a traveling martial artist, fighting bouts with other instructors in multiple states.

Out of all of those life experiences, one of the most emotionally powerful was the first day of Occupy Minnesota, when the Occupy Wall Street movement first came out west. The atmosphere on that first day was intoxicating and joyful. There were hundreds and hundreds of people there, of all ages and races and backgrounds. The feeling in the air was one of incredible optimism, and for anyone alive in the United States since 9/11, that's an unusual feeling to say the least.

It felt like a new awakening, like people had shaken the cobwebs out of their eyes after a long, long sleep. It felt like I had a thousand or so new sisters and brothers, standing together with me in solidarity against the forces working to destroy our democracy. The feeling was so expansive, so incredible, that I wanted to be back there every single day, working to help make a better world with my fellow Occupiers.

Things are different now. The mood has changed, and Occupy is now marked by a sense of grim determination to hold on in the face of tremendous repression rather than by an expansive feeling of joy and happiness. I think that initial experience is what keeps us all fighting, despite everything they do to put barriers in our way. We know that another world is possible, because we all experienced it- even if only for a little while.