“Happiness can be found even in the darkest of times, when one only remembers to turn on the light."
On my way home from work today, I got so emotional. It finally hit me that we lost over thirty people due to mass shootings this weekend. And the rhetoric about mental health being the problem always hits me, because we want to blame everything on being mentally ill but never do anything about mental health. We shut down facilities designed to help, or de-fund them to the point where they're barely useful, staffed by people who are struggling to stay caring while dealing with more case load than they can comfortably keep up with for pay that is practically laughable. So we'll say mental illness is the only cause, then we should be doing something to help the mentally ill.
Do I know what we should do? No. I don't know. I know that I'm so very tired of seeing the headlines of another mass shooting by some over-privileged white American guy. I can have a whole rant about toxic masculinity, I could share my opinion about gun control and piss off some of the people the follow me, but why?
There's a song by John Legend that played when I was driving home, and there's a line, "Though I do believe, I can't just preach." It's called, you guessed it, "Preach." It's actually a very moving song about how the world looks dark sometimes, and to be the change you wish to see in the world.
So I'm sick. All the time. I fight thoughts of self harm on a regular basis, I hate myself so much sometimes that I wish someone would shoot ME instead of those innocent people just going about their days. Some days my symptoms are barely noticeable sometimes there's a voice as loud as my own in my head telling me just how worthless I am. And you know what I did with that? Not kill 20 people with an AK-47. But I can tell you that mental illness IS an issue in this country. I don't spend $50 a month on medication and another $50 a therapy session because it doesn't exist. I'm lucky I can currently afford it, but there are plenty of people that have to decide between their medications [all kinds actually, but I'm only focusing on mental health ... the state of pharmaceutical companies is beyond a blog post worth of ranting] and their groceries, or things for their kids. I've seen it with friends and family on a regular basis.
I live each day trying to keep my head up, and elevate those around me. I try to be the change I wish to see in the world. I know I fail, I know some days I let the light on my candle blow out and leave it that way. I'm human. But we as a society need to DO something besides pass judgment on each other, we need to stop talking about how fucking tragic this is because talk is cheap. I don't know what to do about it so I'm no better. But what I'm going to do by myself is just try to brighten one person's life every day that I'm on this planet and see where that leads until I have more answers.
Thoughts and prayers are fine, but they're just not enough anymore.
Do I know what we should do? No. I don't know. I know that I'm so very tired of seeing the headlines of another mass shooting by some over-privileged white American guy. I can have a whole rant about toxic masculinity, I could share my opinion about gun control and piss off some of the people the follow me, but why?
There's a song by John Legend that played when I was driving home, and there's a line, "Though I do believe, I can't just preach." It's called, you guessed it, "Preach." It's actually a very moving song about how the world looks dark sometimes, and to be the change you wish to see in the world.
So I'm sick. All the time. I fight thoughts of self harm on a regular basis, I hate myself so much sometimes that I wish someone would shoot ME instead of those innocent people just going about their days. Some days my symptoms are barely noticeable sometimes there's a voice as loud as my own in my head telling me just how worthless I am. And you know what I did with that? Not kill 20 people with an AK-47. But I can tell you that mental illness IS an issue in this country. I don't spend $50 a month on medication and another $50 a therapy session because it doesn't exist. I'm lucky I can currently afford it, but there are plenty of people that have to decide between their medications [all kinds actually, but I'm only focusing on mental health ... the state of pharmaceutical companies is beyond a blog post worth of ranting] and their groceries, or things for their kids. I've seen it with friends and family on a regular basis.
I live each day trying to keep my head up, and elevate those around me. I try to be the change I wish to see in the world. I know I fail, I know some days I let the light on my candle blow out and leave it that way. I'm human. But we as a society need to DO something besides pass judgment on each other, we need to stop talking about how fucking tragic this is because talk is cheap. I don't know what to do about it so I'm no better. But what I'm going to do by myself is just try to brighten one person's life every day that I'm on this planet and see where that leads until I have more answers.
Thoughts and prayers are fine, but they're just not enough anymore.
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