The Bones Of The Next Chapter (2018)

A small group of poetic colleagues—Julie Onoh, Aiden Bex, Linda Lokhee, Jared Presser, Lucija Hranjec, Bryan Edwards, Daniel Moreschi, and others—encouraged the evolution of Translations of Hope from project to community towards the end of 2018.

Lucija went one step further and, in a gesture of immense kindness, created the very first logo, giving the project not only identity, but understanding its spirit. Even though it later changed, we kept the base of her work intact because kindness like that is rare.

Our First Community Formation (2019)

During the global pandemic, the community actually formed only when a group of passionate mental health advocates came together in 2019 to form what would become our first real heart circle: a temporary but powerful community of creators known as our IGP's Hope Dealers.

This beautiful circle included Miriam Otto, Ismet Diab, Talitha Doss, Shruti Jaykumar, Nishadi Thantrige, Balaji V, Priscilla Dias, Ash Laperle, Timi Jolaoso, Arun Chandra and of course, Reena Doss. There were others who showed interest at first, but dropped out, and soon only a steady group continued for a year.

To celebrate this closeness, Reena Doss encouraged them to start a book collaboration group because IGP wanted to surprise them with a gift of getting published and to thank them for volunteering their time, service, and care so generously. After they had submitted their pieces, IGP compiled, edited, and published Magical Jar in 2020 for the circle.

What these Mental Health Advocates did for TOH (2020)

The Facebook Archival Phase (2022 - 2023)

Along the way, other members' pathways diverged. Instead of dissolving, we decided we had to move towards a new direction—mental health zines, advocacy, and publishing with specific themes. This evolution helped us place Magical Jar in the Golden Hours Bookshelf as our very first group collaboration.

During 2022 and 2023, we chose to archive the TOH posts, videos, and curations on Facebook by moving them from their main place on Instagram. We did this to preserve the immense hard work of these early mental health advocates, while continuing to showcase the brilliant writers, artists, and creatives they had found along the journey.

The Emergence Of The Lanterns (2024 - 2025)

In 2024–2025, we entered a season of quiet planning, restructuring, and intentional building, as we realized that in the long run, we couldn't sustain the purpose of what we were doing with many shifting volunteers helping to build community. Out of this reflective period, the next phase of our multilingual zines was born. The Lanterns emerged in 2025 with the launch of our first solo series: For You.

Present Future (2026 onwards)

In 2026, we are expanding our horizons and adding more collaborative series to our archive. We are officially opening up submissions for new collaborative series at The Prism Forum under The Lanterns, inviting a fresh wave of creative voices to step forward.