Another mass shooting has occurred…”
“Twelve people were killed when a shooter opened fire…”
There is a deep ache in my heart today that defies description. It feels somehow exacerbated when I read headlines or hear reports that use the term “another.” That give a statistic that somehow categorizes and yet minimizes the individuals lost and the countless souls that are left to grieve. We try and somehow turn unspeakable tragedy into manageable soundbites.
It truly isn’t that twelve people were killed in another mass shooting. It is that one precious, irreplaceable, unique, and loved person was murdered twelve times.
And this a new kind of norm? Mass destruction and murder as the latest news cycle? More political fodder to feed a left or right agenda?
It will never be any kind of a norm for me. These are not stats. I care not for the agenda. I will not deaden myself to the grief and loss that is inherent in an awakened shared humanity.
I have done a lot of inner work to become available to life, to love, and to loss. To allow my heart to be used as a chalice of transformation during these beyond trying times. I have made enough space, through my own forgiveness, to hold all those directly effected by these heinous acts. I will let this deepen, not deaden me. I will turn within, not away. I cry with you. I feel with you. I share in your loss.
There is a deep ache in my heart today that defies description.
Words fail.
