Well it finally happened in my home state yesterday. A school shooting. From what I recall, Columbine in Colorado started off this deadly trend of people who were under a lot of stress and strain in life, many times kids, trying to fix their problems the only way they could figure out…. take a gun to school and use it.
Yesterday it happened in our back yard. And today and tomorrow that community will begin it’s grief of loss, luckily no one died but a 6th grade girl took a gun to school after getting bullied by two boys and shot them in their extremities, not a kill shot but just one to get someone’s attention, to change their behavior. A janitor stepped in front of those boys and she shot him in the arm or leg. Clean wound. He was released from the hospital. The boys and the janitor will be labeled victims, the 6th grade girl the perpetrator.
The grief of loss, not life in this case, but a sense of safety, safety for our children. America has a problem and no one knows how to fix or doesn’t have the political or personal will to do anything about it. Therefore the soul of American grows larger much like our COVID waistlines, we grow lazier and more complacent and become numbed by school shootings. Comfortably numb!!!
Definitions of Victims and Perpetrators get all twisted when children are involved. Obviously we have some issues here. Violence, violence with guns or whatever weaponry it is, mental health. Mental health. There’s the tie-in to a good thing. When life gets really tough, how do you deal with that? As a 50-something man, I have a lifetime of experiences to draw from. What works for me may not work for you. But things I’ve gone to the well on since I was in grade school to now, to help me deal with tough times: music, night drives, road trips, talks with friends and family who I know and trust, drives or vacations to get away to another place to get my mind clear and return again right back where I left off, just being & existing among the mountains. All good things.
These things work for me… to clear the mind. If you are 12, 13, 14 years, teens… up to any age really. If you don’t have those coping mechanisms you may go up into a bell tower on the campus of The University of Texas in Austin with a high powered hunting rifle and hunt people below. Is it right? No.
Is it right to go into Sandy Hook Elementary & do evil acts? No, it’s terrible. But If we are able to separate the evilness of the act and try to understand the person and how they got there, therein lies the rub. Seek to understand and shove aside being understood for a moment. Just for a moment. And then the moment will be gone. —Kansas
Clearing the Mind Through Music:
A little Rage Music never hurt no one. In fact I tend to find it cathartic every now and then. This greater genre has several sub-genre’s that go by such names as: Screamo, Post-Core, Noise Metal, Thrash, Grindcore, Alterna-Scream…. you get the picture. Bands that work for me are The Pixies, Tool, Rage Against, Rise Against, McLusky, Chevelle, Breaking Benjamin, Bullet for My Valentine, and yes… even that Christian Rock band from Temple-Killeen, Texas area Flyleaf. All help to clear the mind.
What Does Clearing The Mind Look Like??
Clearing the Mind Through a Drive
Talking it Out
Sometimes you owe it to yourself to seek out new ways to clear your mind along with the tried and true methods you’ve always had. Maybe sometimes the present pain requires more. Start learning to pass that coping skills and tips for what works for you to the youth. Your children, your children’s children. Realize when you are stuck in the moment… This Too Shall Pass. Keep repeating it like a mantra trying this coping skills, regardless if you are 16 or 52. Teach each other that life is a Marathon not a 100 Yard Sprint. This Too Shall Pass.
This too shall pass.
This too shall pass.
This too shall pass.
Breathe deep. And again.
And then it does… it passes.
This too has passed.
Breathe.
Just breathe.
Oh by the way here are some other cool images I found…
Clearing the mind & keeping life in balance. Good things!!!
ZandMe's 999 Good Things 