As I passed around my phone so everyone could catch a glimpse of next year's colors, the team spontaneously cheered. Next year's colors? "Many feel compelled to be connected around the clock because we are afraid we'll miss something important. There is a growing movement to step out and create 'quiet zones' to disconnect from technology and unwind, giving ourselves time to stop and be still. Color choices follow the same minimalistic, 'en plein air' theme, taking a cue from nature rather than being reinvented or mechanically manipulated. Soft, cool hues blend with subtle warm tones to create a soothing escape from teh everyday hustle and bustle." (Leatrice Eiseman, Pantone Color Institute)

There is a corporate chuckle as I read the psychology behind the color choices, and our Ruhamah staff exhale a sense of shared resonance. While the world at large is needing quiet white space from the flurry and drive, temptations and demands of technology, the color choices also signal a much needed direction to all of us in Ruhamah Designs. We acknowledge our need of the physical reminder of color, to retreat from time to time from the agony and pathos of our girls, to breathe deeply and re-calibrate. 

Ruhamah Designs isn't just a business. It's so much more. Our employees aren't the usual segment of the population with the average set of hang-ups and issues that we all face. Our girls exhibit brokenness that defies mending, insecurities that play like shadows on their faces at work, fears that paralyze as they strive to meet quotas, disproportionate rage that bubbles to the surface during ordinary interactions with supervisors and co-workers, and unchecked tears that course down their cheeks as they hammer out earrings. They each have personal stories that we can only imagine; each carry pain we can never fully understand.

In Ruhamah, we see a range of emotions that mirror our own, but are a thousand times stronger, a thousand times more intense. Sometimes the play of emotion is ferocious, sometimes debilitating and always it is exhausting, for the girl, and for those around her.

So, here we all were, stepping back from the dramas at our workshops, and making time in our hectic schedules for rest at a Catholic retreat center.

​We needed to share the stories of the girls we serve, process the pain of the lives we encounter every day, and brainstorm solutions to the complex issues we face a the work place. We needed to share our moments of baffling hopelessness in the face of the girl's anguish, the gifts of counsel, unheeded, the warnings of destructive behavior, sadly ignored, the patterns of self-destruction that we saw, but could not stop.

We needed to step back and problem solve together, not isolated, independent bodies spread apart by thousands of miles, but together, as one united group of people who pray, long for and hope for one great dream, for our girl's wholeness.

We needed to breathe deeply and remember afresh how to care for ourselves, our bodies, minds, and souls.

So, we gave ourselves time to connect with each other and our Creator. We gave ourselves the chance to have fun, to shop in the wonderful city of Bangalore. We purchased saris and fancy salwars, block printed fabric and special sweets to take back home. We dreamed about the future of Ruhamah over cups of really good coffee.

It was a short week together, but long enough to reaffirm that our strength comes from our Creator and Sustainer and to revel and refuel in His love. We returned from the press of this world for a short while, both fr ourselves and for the girls we sere, so that we  

Kamna joined Freedom Fir's aftercare program at Ooty in its initial stages. Kamna, like all our artisans, was rescued from the brutal industry of sex trafficking and then chose to be a part of Freedom Firm’s growing aftercare program. The aftercare program was launched by Greg and Mala Malstead in 2006, to reach out to rescued girls who were seeking a safe place to learn and grow.

Ruhamah Designs as it is known today first began in the Freedom Firm aftercare home where they learnt vital life skills.  It was a haven where their deepest emotions could be expressed without inhibition. For Kamna and other girls, Roja, the aftercare home, turned out to be a place where they began to walk the road to recovery. Besides being counseled and cared for the girls were also given an opportunity to be educated and learn jewelry making as an activity in the afternoons.​

The first Ruhamah Workshop began as a jewelry making activity in the serene hills of Ooty, in Tamil Nadu. Secluded from the hustle and bustle of city congestion, characterizing most Indian cities, the town was an ideal location for the girls to overcome fears of their past and to bond with others who had experienced similar trauma. In an informal setting where they experienced freedom, the girls grew and Ruhamah Designs developed to what it is today.

Many more girls were being rescued as a result of Freedom Firm’s rescue operations in Maharashtra and consequently girls began to join the aftercare program at Ooty. We also began to receive referral cases from remand homes where girls were housed after their rescue. This created the need for aftercare programs at strategic spots in India to be able to reach out to girls rescued from sex-trafficking.

Identifying this need, a workshop was established in Pune, Maharashtra in 2012 where most of Freedom Firm’s rescue operations took place. This gave girls a chance to remain close to their home state.
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​We started the Ruhamah workshop at Kolkata in 2013 to stem the tide of re-traffiking in the area. Many rescued girls were unable to find work because of the region's extreme economic  depression.  Opening a Ruhamah Designs workshop gave girls a viable option for employment.
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​In 2014, we launched a workshop, the first of its kind, within a governmental home in Nagpur. We discovered that a majority of the girls were children and faced the risk of being re-trafficked once they were released. For the workshop to be within this remand home meant that girls were provided with an opportunity to be trained in jewelry making and then choose to join one of our three workshops once they were released.

Currently, 33 artisans work and do life in our four different workshops. Workshop managers and social workers interact, encourage and help the girls engage in a life different from the one they experienced at the brothels. Uneducated, poor and robbed of their freedom, the girls transform into independent artisans in their own right.
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Kamna is now one of our expert artisans at the Ooty workshop. She has seen the ebbs and flows Ruhamah has come through in the past years and she too is a transformed person today.  ​​