Nothing just happens…
Why are you so angry? So bitter? Think about it? Could it be your response?
I can remember, like it was yesterday standing there with a man as they led him back to prison from Court. An entire community is raging! His mother with tears streaming down her face, the painkillers had been prescribed because his surgery wouldn’t be scheduled for nine months. A Professional Arborist, one of the best in the northeast, who used his shoulders to make his living swinging from a rope 100 feet in the air; his chainsaw running all day. But it’s his fault? He should not have become addicted? He never should have left his children as a consequence of the disease that took over his life? How dare he? But you didn’t know the truth? Ignorant to what they were doing to him along with the power they had to cover it up…
I stood there grounded. Unwavering. Regardless of the excruciating pain, I stood with him as an entire community canceled me. Where was the empathy and compassion, he was sick? Can we handle that yet? Or does that still make you angry? Everyone was so crazy, angry back then? Looks like we still are. BUT NOTHING JUST HAPPENS…
So maybe it’s you? You, who is deserving of empathy and compassion? Maybe you’re the one in pain now? The one who has lost a child? With all the chaos and confusion, who’s been paying attention to what you need? Suffering all alone. You wouldn’t be lashing out if you weren’t? Well, I’m here to tell you, you’re not. I never thought I’d recover from the pain from that time in my life, but by confronting it head on, I’ve been redeemed. That same redemption is available to you.
100,000 people are dying every year. Fentanyl is pouring in over our border. Gun violence is ravaging our cities, and innocent people are getting shot. Not to mention the carnage from the fallout from the disease. People still live in poverty and kids are being trafficked @ our border. This is not new, but now it’s touched you. Are we done complaining yet? Our children deserve better. There is a root cause, and a method to resolve all of this madness. The billionaire Sackler Family, who once controlled Purdue Pharma, the maker of the prescription painkiller OxyContin, is widely blamed for igniting this. It goes deeper than that, though. We only have to look back to Mena AR, where from 1981 to 1985, its airport was a major transit point for the entrance of cocaine and heroin into the United States. We can thank Bill Clinton and the CIA for that. What’s being done to solve any of this? Nothing because the lawyers and politicians are lining their pockets, and we’re too busy virtue signaling. All part of the plan. They want us divided. Your anger works for them. Stay bitter. Fight one another, there you go… as nothing gets solved. So, I suggest we stop! Let’s critically think and take a whole new approach.
Order is what we need… Restoration is upon us.
Everything is connected. We can bring an end to gun violence. We can STOP THE CARTELS. But it requires empathy and compassion for one another. Perhaps more importantly it requires understanding our country’s backstory. There is a root cause and it’s led to mass destruction! There is a promised land where everyone can win. Where we leave no one behind…
Letting go of your anger and contemplating this leadership opportunity is, perhaps, a start.