Dying Man’s Daily Journal – Still learning/still growing

Yesterday really wore me out. I was in bed extra early and will no doubt be taking good advantage of my nap time today. Feeling good, no problems like that or anything just tired and worn out.

I really want to thank my dear blogging friend Mel for reminding me of something I know and do belief but occasionally I obviously forget. This is I suppose a prime example of the power of words. Mel, reading your comment yesterday had a great power and healing affect on me. I thank you and am so appreciative of you sharing your wisdom. I really needed to hear that at that moment to “wake me up”.

Here in Winnipeg we had what can only be described as a hate group announcing their intentions to come to disrupt a funeral. I have said so many times that I do believe any death is so much harder on the family. A funeral is such an intense time of grief and mourning for the family and loved ones even just plain common decency should dictate they be allowed to do this in peace. Thoughts of death, funerals etc. strike kind of close to home for me on a very personal level with my health issues.

Ask anyone that knows me, I am a very calm, relaxed, mellow sort of guy and allow virtually nothing to really get to me. The past few days though has taught me that I do indeed have buttons that can be pushed. Hearing of the intent of this group in fact pushed everyone of them. I ALLOWED this to really get to me and sent me on a rant. My last blog post is but a small example of my rant. I had the phone lines burning. I phoned the offices of: the Prime Minister of Canada, the Premier of Manitoba, the Mayor of the city of Winnipeg, countless government officials and police departments. They all heard my thoughts on this. Now understand when I say rant, I never yell or scream, curse or swear, I just get my message across in a very open and I hope clear way. I do believe I was right in doing all of that and given the same circumstances would do it all over again. When I believe something is wrong, it is wrong and I will do what I can to try and fix is, even if it is only a few phone calls. I admit it does give me a bit of a sense of satisfaction or something knowing I at least did something anything is better than nothing at all. I feel that if enough people do just a little bit and you then add up all those little bits you get a whole lot done.

Mel wrote of her own terrible experience with possibly the same group as she was attempting to help others affected by a tragedy. Now, Mel’s entire comment was excellent but one line in particular jumped out and hit me.

“I did vowed to not let them ‘live rent free in my head’. Other people needed my energies and my attention.”

That line hit me like a ton of bricks. That was exactly what I was doing. I had allowed this group access into my head and was allowing them to stay there and even dominate my thoughts. I was letting them win, I was letting them get to me on a very personal level. Based on their bizarre actions, I can only imagine that this is exactly what they want to happen. Draw attention to themselves gain publicity by doing the unthinkable, staging a political protest at a funeral.

Well they got me as did they accomplish their goal with countless other Canadians. Off hand I can’t recall a time when such a small group has stirred up such a frenzy in such a large group of Canadians virtually the entire country. Really that is pretty sad when I think of it.

I go to the second sentence or Mel’s comment:

“Other people needed my energies and my attention.” My thoughts and prayers go to the grieving family. How tragic to have a son murdered and then to have to try and deal with all of this in your time of grief and mourning.

I have to wonder to myself, this whole episode stirred up so much public reaction and a lot of that reaction was on the negative side of the scale, as was mine. I have to wonder what could we do to stir up the same amount of reaction but somehow have all the energy directed in a positive way.

I had several surprises come to me through this time.

First, that my buttons can be pushed to this extend and that I would react this strongly to a situation. I thought I was past all of that sort of thing, allowing things to really get to me in this way. I like to consider myself a spiritual person and my reactions here really wouldn’t indicate that. I guess I have to cut myself a little slack and appreciate, I am only human, I am still leaning and still growing.

Second, I was truly surprised to learn that there is a group that represents themselves as being a Christian church and can have such hate based beliefs. This has been a real eye opener for me. I think it is almost to easy to just be tempted to brush them off as just being a group of extremist, fringe element lunatics and don’t represent the majority. They don’t represent the majority so just ignore them, fair enough. Are we as tolerant of extremist, fringe elements of other faiths. Now let’s just take the Muslim faith as an example. Now I am certainly not trying to imply they would but let’s just use this as a comparison. Let’s just suppose it was indeed a Muslim group that did EXACTLY the same thing as this supposed “Christian” group was doing. Would we be as openly tolerant? I pose this just as a question, as I don’t know.

Third, I was saddened to see how quickly this seemed to turn in to mud slinging contest, Canadians vs Americans. I have heard and read some hurtful and just plain ridiculous comments going back and forth from both sides. Geesh, what can I say, shake your heads people. At some point in history someone drew a magic line on a map to separate Canada and the U.S.. A line on a map is all that separates us as people. As countries we have different views at times. I am talking a people, a line someone drew on a map is all that separates us. To all my American friends because of simple geography like it or not you are “stuck” with us Canadians as neighbors. I repeat exactly the same thing to all Canadians because of simple geography we are “stuck” with the Americans as our neighbors. I mean “stuck” in a respectful and joking way. When it comes right down to it we are all just people. Let’s not let a line drawn on a map separate us.

The power of words is a wonderful thing. Mel, I thank you for sharing yours with me. I needed to hear them, I am still learning and growing. Mel, I also learned from you and while I do admit it was almost grudgingly I did include “ALL” in my prayers.