Changing Things.

Image credit: Pixabay

"Things" won't change until you do.

I woke to the story of another mass shooting this morning. ("Another mass shooting". How the hell is that even an acceptable combination of words to describe the events in our world?)

I read the reactions - the heartache, the anger. Our human reactions.

And I await the rest of the stories to arise in the public media sphere. The same stories. Gun control or fierce defense of one's own firearm, gay rights or a backlash against them, the eventual passing of time and a forgetting of these stories until another event brings them to mind.

What stories arise in your mind? What emotions swell in your heart? Most likely the same ones that did the last time a tragedy like this occurred. 

What stories will arise in your mind this afternoon? Tomorrow? Do they sound a lot alike?

I'm not saying that "another mass shooting" will keep happening until YOU change your stories. I am saying that "things" - mass shootings included - are not separate from you.

The stories that you have in your own head, you act out each day. Same with your neighbor's stories, and her neighbor's stories. Along the way, these stories weave themselves into one another.

The person who went out and did this shooting brought his own stories that night, but they were interwoven with the stories of countless others who had supported or dismissed him, who had given breath to the ideas he had in his head.

Take responsibility for the only thing you can - YOUR story. 

Engage with your thoughts and create with your actions the type of world in which "another mass shooting" is not a common phrase. Honor Mahatma Gandhi's famous quote, "You must be the change you want to see in the world".

Begin with your self, your story, your thoughts, this moment.