On a shelf in my garage sits a wooden toolbox. It’s handmade, assembled from scraps of plywood, particle board, some electrical conduit. It’s not a beautiful object in the conventional sense, but every nail and joint tells a story. 

It was a gift from a man who had spent over twenty years incarcerated in a federal Penitentiary. When I met him, he was a new resident at the halfway house where I worked nights – St. Leonard’s House – Peel. I was twenty-six, not long out of university with a degree in Psychology. What I learnt on night shifts for a year taught me as much as any classroom ever could. 

Among the questions I couldn’t stop asking:  How do you help a man?  Not how to fix, or advise, or rescue—but truly help. 

The man who made the box had been a carpenter before prison. He carried himself with the quiet steadiness of someone who understood the language of wood and tools—who had once shaped things with purpose. I don’t recall exactly how it began, but at some point we decided I would  receive a toolbox, to help me with my projects. Perhaps it was a gesture of gratitude, or perhaps it was his way of remembering what it felt like to build something again, something that might outlast him. 

When he gave it to me, I could see what it  represented. It was more than a box—it was an act of reclaiming identity. Built from discarded materials, it carried a message I’ve never forgotten: that redemption often begins by making use of what remains, by transforming what’s been overlooked. 

All these years later, I’ve stayed in the business of psychology. I’ve worked in hospitals, private clinics, and with groups learning to navigate their inner worlds. My motivation remains much the same—to help bring people into movement with their own minds and hearts, toward helping themselves and one another. 

Communication, cooperation, and relationship remain at the core of what I believe in.  The wooden toolbox reminds me that healing isn’t always abstract—it’s often tactile, rooted in patience and craft. Working with material teaches us about pace, about seeing something through, about the vision and strength it takes to turn scraps into something sturdy and useful. The man who built that box taught me that purpose doesn’t come from perfection, but from the act of creating with what we have.  

Now, when I see it, I don’t just see a carpenter’s handiwork—I see a lesson that continues to guide my work as a therapist. The best way to help a man is to let him help others. Healing often begins there—in the act of creating, restoring, or serving. Agency and purpose take root when we find meaning in what lies before us, when we learn to repair what was left behind, and believe it can hold weight again. 

– Gerry Gange