If Only We Had Known ....

If Only We had Known

Beyond the video itself ... the issue of Mental Health, or Mental Illness, is slowly brewing beneath the general (American?) conscientiousness – awareness.  The obvious tragedy involving mass shootings by young men (that should be unchallenged) continues unabated.  As much as the focus has been on that, which is understandable, millions of others go untreated and suffering continues to be buried.  As these burials continue, a tiny fraction of those buried, stew and brew and begin to time-fuse into potential catastrophes.

Along with those time-bombs laid under our universal global grounding, are the scores of millions who loose what could be productive lives and are forced to live far below their potential.  And, with that, more than anything else, we all loose.

As a member of the community that has been labeled as, with what continues to be growing strength, the Mentally Ill (Disordered), I can only say the stigmata that is attached will collapse under its own weight.  By this I indicate that today, everyone fits somewhere on the curve of mental stability (normalcy) – and I do mean everyone.  It is truly only a matter of where, exactly.  We, as a species, are ALL subject to this assessment, it is only a matter of how each one of us tends to react under extreme stress, and when. 

If you research the term “Kindling”, you find it basically means that ALL of us are subject to emotional stress and the potential effects of TBI and/or genetics.  Kindling is when the on-going, multiple, effects of brain trauma (from whatever source) build to a point where the brain flashes-over from a small (normal) flame, as it were, to a full-blown bonfire.  To a fire of uncontrollable heat and major destructive force.  And, once injured brain tissue does not heal – it remains damaged.  The regions of the brain that control behavior are often the first to be affected.

What this means, is that once you cross-over, or are pushed onto a part of that curve, past the nominal normal region, you can’t go back.  You either begin to decompose or you seek help.  It is often said, that you have to “let people hit rock-bottom” before they will get help.  One problem with that is that the unaffected remain stoically loyal to the concept that rock-bottom is an actual thing.  Rock-bottom is suicide!  That is what rock-bottom, is in the real world.  Or, more actually, suicide is what is waits under that rock.

And, it is so avoidable, it really is.  A kind word at some point karmically in the life of anyone at what is possibly a flashpoint in their lives, can actually save them.  One single word, possible only if stigma and judgment can be avoided and/or overcome, at the time when the affected person may seem least worthy, can save them.  A kind action.  Even a simple smile, even in the face of what might seem abuse from another. 

Yes, it is difficult to do – to reserve retaliation, or worse, revenge and proffer understanding and forgiveness.  It takes courage, high bravery.  But, the choice is there, to live with regret or with the knowledge that you did the right thing.