Backstage with Dr. Laurie Johnson, LPC
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| One of my heroes... Dale Beatty. Purple Heart Homes |
If Not For You: Reasons Why You Matter
I've heard people call this planet a big blue marble.
I've heard it called "our island home."
I've heard it called lots of soft, romantic names.
I've heard people call the folks who populate it "our global family," the "family of man," "humankind" and "our brothers and sisters."
But some of you reading this know differently.
You know that humankind can be anything but kind.
You know that "our island home" is anything but peaceful or safe.
I'm talking to you.
The way you found out this circle of dirt, sand, rock and rubble we walk on is less than beautiful, is because you've been places where beauty died or was murdered ages ago.
What's left there, are shreds or shrapnel or shadows of goodness forgotten a long time ago.
Why were you there?
Maybe to bring liberation.
Maybe to teach.
Maybe to feed.
Maybe to bring medicine.
Maybe to keep the peace.
Maybe to clean up.
Maybe to salvage.
Maybe to crawl into the blackest stinking cave to rescue the innocents trapped there.
Maybe to bring order, or to rekindle the hope of order. The hope that chaos and evil hadn't already swallowed the world and grinned with a vicious belch.
Maybe you went to a jungle.
Maybe to a desert.
Maybe to a hotel room where you knew children were being sold and raped day after day behind that door.
Maybe you went to a classroom empty of books, but full of weapons, hate and despair.
Maybe you went to a clinic without water or instruments or any medicine other than the dignity you could show mothers whose babies were dying in their arms.
Maybe you went to a neighborhood infested with leeches who enslave others into addiction, crime, prostitution, and every manner of cruelty and exploitation…just because they can. Just because they are sick monsters.
Maybe that neighborhood is online. Maybe you patrol the information highway, trolling to catch the subhumans who love to fondle babies and rape children and swap pictures and make movies and explore new depths of depravity with their gory, monster friends.
Maybe you go to a hospital where there is more blood donated on the floor every night than could ever be stocked by Red Cross. Where little kids come in with unspeakable injuries from sick ass parents who shouldn't have been allowed to have pets, much less kids. Where women come in beaten and cut by men who "love" with rage. Where young men come in, dead before 20 because of a gang's entertainment or rituals. Where cancer is ripping and gnawing babies too young to walk and teens who never got to see the world and adults too sad to do anything but stare at you in desperate pain.
I'm here to tell you something:
It mattered.
Please hear me.
It mattered.
I realize, fully, that I'd be an idiot to say that if I were in range of your being able to haul something at me, spit at me, strike me, or otherwise clean my clock for speaking such a repulsive, know-nothing, sappy, empty promise pile of crap.
But it is still true.
You made a difference.
Even if you didn't see it. Even if you can't see it now.
I'll take the risk of deserving your wrath, so long as I can try to help you get this truth.
You made a difference.
In the Big War-- be it combat, poverty, human trafficking, rescuing people from addiction or heinous exploitation, disease, crime or subhuman existence-- you may look back on the battles, the deaths, the casualties, and the sinkhole that replaced the ground where you stood for a brief time, battling the darkness, and feel your fight was in vain.
It wasn't.
Those battles still rage. Many at the same address. Folks are still waging wars against those monsters that devour information and technology and sick imagination, in order to cripple, maim, kill and destroy islands of hope.
But, guess who fed those islands of hope?
You did.
Give me a second, here.
When you went into the darkness and came back, there was something missing inside of you, wasn't there?
The first answer for those of you who were in military combat is probably, "Hell yeah!" You can immediately point to the stump that used to be a leg or an arm. Your hearing was shot, your nerves were shot, you came home to nightmares and daymares and all kinds of shit that the public calls PTSD and pretends to have some clue about. Right.
You sure as hell came back with missing parts. The kind you see, the kind you hide, and the kind you can't hide. You sure as hell have your wounds. The world doesn’t fit anymore. People around you are clueless and soft. They have no problem whining or running their mouths about stupid shit. More and more, they look at you with this dumb ass curiosity of "I saw the movie, American Sniper or Platoon and now I'm wondering just how messed up you are but I won't say anything" expressions.
Some interrupt your thirty minute endurance trial at Wal-Mart with "I want to thank you for your service," and instead of helping, all it does is flashback buddies' faces who didn't come back, or came back with more trauma than body parts. Nothing makes sense anymore but you're supposed to smile and nod thanks and rise up to your 7 foot stature in the eyes of that person or kid. What he or she doesn't know, is that you're proud of the guys and gals you served with, but you're not proud of the unwinnable war some bureaucratic dipshit put you in.
Nor are you proud to have come home, since some of your buddies chose to deploy again, and some newbies are headed over there to compromise the troop, and worst of all, there's no pride in knowing how many of your battle buddies died over there. If not physically died, died emotionally and mentally capped out. You know why 22 Vets a day off themselves.
But here in the produce aisle you're supposed to say "Thank-you, Ma'am" and "Sure, kid." No problem. You've got the whole rest of the day to fight demons and sounds and flashbacks and mood swings from having it all brought back by some do-gooder who doesn't have a clue.
And yet, that annoyance is nothing compared to the lady or grandmother or dad who strikes up a conversation with you, to tell you their son or daughter is over there serving. You don't have the heart to tell them what it is really like, when they mention the sanitized version their kid has told them. You don't want to tell them what shape their kid will come back in. If they make it back. You don't want to tell them shit. You never come to Wal-Mart or anywhere else to shop if you can help it. When you do, it is not to stand out as the poster guy or poster girl for civilians' guilt relief.
So…how can I say that what you did over there mattered? Or what your fallen buddies did, mattered?
Because, the Big War is only part of the picture. Idiots in high office and despots around the world will always cook up more combat.
Life is lived in the little moments, but that does not make them insignificant.
I daresay some of the little moments are the biggest.
Like when you got that buddy to laugh after he got the Dear John email.
Like when you pulled a prank on that buddy, getting even for the prank he pulled on you.
Like when you gave that gal a break, and everybody followed suit and it turned the tide. She became a helluva warrior, and what you did mattered. Whether she was active duty or a nurse or a technician--you treated her with dignity and made sure other guys did too.
On the dark side, maybe you were the one she could confide in about being harassed or raped. You couldn't undo it, but if you were there for her, as one of the good guys, it mattered. It may have mattered when she sized up men as brothers or monsters in arms. It probably still matters today.
What you did, mattered.
When you held that buddy as he bled out, he had your arms around him and your words and shouts drowning out his cries. It mattered.
When you gave that kid in the village a candy bar, it mattered. He may see Americans as the great haters and infidels, but there was one who looked him in the eye with genuine kindness. That's unforgettable. That was as damaging to his version of American, as an IED. Even if he doesn't want to, he's got that memory because you put it there.
It mattered. What you did, mattered.
That woman, who expected to be raped by you, or at least brutalized in other ways, remembers the American soldier or sailor or airman or Marine who showed her dignity and kindness.
These are the kinds of things that start ripples.
Ripples start streams.
Streams converge to rivers.
Rivers feed oceans.
Don't scorn ripples.
What you did, mattered. What you did not do, matters.
Am I saying that your part in the Big War was significant? It was, in the sense that you fought an equally big war--the War of Who Will You Be?
Some of you were never drafted and you didn't enlist. You did not serve in the military. But you were (maybe are still) in the Big War of Who Will You Be?
I'm privileged to know someone who lost both legs in an accident as a teen, who now inspires the world about the things that truly undergird us as we walk through this life.
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| Reggie Showers... one amazing guy |
I know someone else whose catastrophic injury, compels him to reach out to others, like the Boston Marathon victims, in order to inspire them. In order to replenish their faith that victory can lie ahead if they bravely choose their role in the War of Who Will You Be?
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| Scott Rigsby, using loss for gain in a huge way! |
Maybe you battle for justice in a law office in Little Town, USA. Maybe you shoulder a nonprofit. Maybe you use your art or engineering or common sense to make the world a better place. Maybe you grow food. Maybe you teach. Maybe you fix things. Maybe you clean things. Maybe you're a Firefighter or EMT. Maybe you are grooming kids into amazing adults. Maybe your time and energy are consumed with physical therapy and rehab. Maybe you are battling back from an addiction or destructive decision. Keep battling!
Whatever you do, it matters!
Maybe you have a short reach.
Maybe you have a deep reach.
Maybe you can't see the benefit of your reach at all.
Please do not define your impact by what you can see or measure.
Maybe you are at a Children's Hospital.
Maybe in Kenya.
Maybe in an outreach to gangs in Philly.
Maybe in inner city schools.
Maybe on the police force.
Maybe working the Border.
Maybe as a journalist trying to get the true story told.
What you do, matters.
Please let me say this to a dear friend and anyone else who needs to hear it. Here goes:
Yes, you lost both legs in combat. The fact that you didn't lose heart, makes you walk taller than almost any other man or woman on this planet.
The platform you have, to speak truth in a sea of falsehood and vanity, matters.
You speak faith and boldness and it casts a thousand seeds in fertile soil.
It matters!
You matter.
No, it was horribly unfair that service to your country in a questionable war took your legs and shattered the calm of life we know before a catastrophic injury. You have suffered a terrible, horrible loss. A physical loss. And now, hanging in the balance, is the risk of losing faith that you were even where you needed to be, when that IED mauled your life and killed buddies.
Because you make life on this side of that tragedy seem okay, does not mean it is okay. None of us will give you the credit you deserve. None of us grasps what it takes to be you. None of us have any clue what all you lost and what if feels like you are now losing, as that bloodshed and campaign seems purposeless.
But what you allow us to have and learn and know, because you held on and refused to let darkness finish the job--that matters.
It is a light in a sea of mist and darkness.
A sea that is deadening and muting spirits everywhere.
This sea of self-absorbsion and entitlement and exploitation that drowns people in pretty but murky waters of meaningless living.
You tell us that there is life out there, to be found. To be made. To be shared.
Life despite tragedy.
Life despite despair.
Life bigger than our own.
Life bigger, because we need to live it for those who went under, for those who were killed in a noble mission, and for those who didn't have the chance to live long enough to follow their dreams.
We live for them, when we fully live.
That doesn't make life fair.
But at least that puts points on the board for those who should've been on the court. It is what we owe them, right? If not for you and the memories you keep, they die in vain.
You don't let that happen.
That matters. You matter. It matters.
On the other hand.....Maybe you're a civilian and these words don't fit you.
Maybe you are in a battle for decency and human rights.
You fought a war against poverty, or starvation or child abuse or human trafficking. Maybe you still fight it.
There are plenty of days that you feel like the War of Decency is being lost to an exploding population of subhuman monsters.
Who can blame you? Who can dispute that?
So, does what you do, matter?
Yes, it matters.
Even for the briefest moments, you were the reason someone thought there was goodness in the world.
That there was a hero in the world.
That there was a glimpse of light in the grotesque darkness keeping them captive.
That was YOU.
Or, perhaps you are a soldier in medical battle. Maybe the captivity, is cancer.
Maybe you were the nurse who could evoke a smile even when the light was ebbing away.
Or could hold a parent, when the light went out.
Maybe you were the phlebotomist who could get a smile and a vein, when nobody else could.
Can you fathom how much that mattered? To that child? To that parent?
To the tide of despair and futility and desperation intent on filling those hospital corridors or hospice?
You stood foursquare against that tide.
Whether it is in a downtown clinic, a pediatric cancer ward, a M.A.S.H. unit, or the nurse's office at school--as the first nurse who refused to buy stories about bruises and UTI's and got a child rescued from a pretty little hell.
Maybe you're the technician running Disney movies for your tiny patients to see when they have nuclear imaging. You stay soft, even though every ounce of survival instinct says "Quit caring. It hurts too much. Just work the equipment."
Day after day.
Maybe, you still do this work.
I can't think of anything more brave.
Maybe, you're not military. Maybe you're not in social work or law enforcement or have a title. Maybe...you battle in silence.
Maybe you battle for your life, as your body seems to war against this planet.
Maybe your sickness has a name, maybe not.
There are no medals given for folks in your kind of warfare.
There are no passes or R&R papers for it, either.
You may battle in a sad, crappy silence, because others do not get it.
After all, there's no fever. How can you be sick?
Maybe you battle sickness in someone else.
A sickness for which there seems no medicine.
Hell, it doesn't even seem like there are people who would care enough to offer medicine even if some were on the shelf.
Maybe that battle is domestic violence...at your own address.
Or the violence that overtakes a mind that is soulsick and off kilter and harms everyone in its path, unintentionally. A mind at war with itself.
He's a nice guy, why would you be afraid of him?
She's lovely. How could you accuse her of anything bad?
Whether you've battled to keep yourself alive, or sane...
Whether you've battled to limit the extent of fury or collateral damage
You deserve to hold your head up.
Hold it up and holler, if need be.
Make a scene. Rattle the neighbors. Get help.
Just never, ever, ever, ever, ever buy the lie that you don't deserve better.
Even when bad comes from a person you dearly love.
Get help.
Help is out there.
Some of the people I've addressed in this essay, are the heroes that will help you.
(See, I told you that your work matters. That you matter!)
To everyone reading this:
You matter.
What you do, matters.
Whether it has a rank or title or paycheck or gets respect or doesn't...
Your life matters and how you spend it matters.
And where you battle for good to win over bad, and health over illness, and peace over conflict, and care over neglect, and decency over apathy:
IT MATTERS.
It is not for loss.
Here's the tough truth:
We don't get to win the War.
Not in our lifetime.
We rarely get to see battles won or skirmishes turn the tide.
What we get to see, is about 10 feet in front of us and around us.
What we get to see is immediate and hasty and chaotic and messy.
That is why we can get so devastated and discouraged.
But, what is inside that micro moment and geography of life is this--human spirits colliding.
Either against hope, or hopelessness.
Either against compassion, or apathy.
Either against dignity, or disgust.
Either against good will, or against exploitation.
Every time you chose hope, compassion, dignity and good will, you chose well.
(Unless you are battling child rapists and violent criminals. In that case, have at it.)
So, here's my point.
You chose life. You fought to live. Not just to exist or survive.
You wouldn't be reading this or listening to this if you weren't a fighter.
For life.
You are a fighter for life and for lives and for living!
Even though it cost you an arm or a leg (perhaps literally) and destroyed the calm, safely cocooned mind you possessed before entering your War...
You had a version of life or faith that you never wanted to lose or have vandalized
You had a buoyant spirit that's now pretty battered.
You're not sure that joy or peace or carefree wonder can be revived.
You've definitely not sure whether you can rekindle a sense of the goodness of humankind.
That seems highly, deeply, madly, completely unlikely.
But it may recover.
Whatever you lost, please know you lost it in a battle that mattered!
You and your offensive or defensive maneuvers in that battle MATTERED far beyond what you could see or can measure.
******************* You matter.**********************
You didn't just light a candle in the darkness.
You lit some one's candle.
For whatever moments or months or years, you lit up their life.
With your friendship.
With your brotherhood or sisterhood.
With your parenting, biological or not.
With your laughter.
With your raunchy or dark humor.
With your delicate smile.
With what you said in times of distress, and what you kept to yourself.
With everything you said without words.
What you DID mattered.
What you DO matters.
Life is not a lost cause;
Not with people like you in it.
Please do not underestimate the good you have brought this world.
Please do not underestimate the good that you've given.
Please do not underestimate the good you are in this world, just by being here in good shape or bad, on good days and bad days.
This world is richer for having you in it. And here's a truth:
Life for many people would have been much harder,
if not for YOU.
Please remember, you are a HERO for what you give of yourself, or for what you GAVE of yourself. You are a HERO. Give yourself credit.
Think about it.
Then give yourself a pat on the shoulder. A hug. A high five. Have a good cry. Have a good stomp if you need to. Find a place to holler. Then, look in a mirror. You will find an amazing, precious, gutsy person in it, awaiting your approval and affection. Please, please, please, open the floodgates of love. You deserve it.
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| Never underestimate the ripples of your life. Heaven notices. |
Note: Tomorrow is Independence Day. I prefer to think of it as Dependence Day, because our deliverance from the greatest empire in the world happened only because we could depend on each other, depend on our Heavenly Father, and depend on goodness to win over complacency, comfort, and convenience.
We are at a place in history where comfort, complacency, convenience and self-absorbsion puts at risk the survival of this great nation.
We are fractious, fighting, and distrusting. But we don't have to be!
Media, music, celebrity pundits and marketeers are polarizing this country. I wrote this piece to help "little people" remember that there is nothing mightier than people with a united heart, mission, and vision for good.
Please pass this along. We are in great need of a revival of courage. May our compassion be contagious!
© dr. laurie davis johnson, lpc 3 july 2015
www.drlauriejohnson.com
