Hi Everyone,
Documentaries have been my “thing” for as long as I can remember. But even I questioned if I wanted to watch the one that really made me think. Although I watched it years before, it has been on my mind for months. It is about the human condition. This is what I mean.
The only topic that always makes me want to change the channel is war. I just can’t get into it. After much internal debate, I reluctantly decided to watch a documentary on child soldiers; female child soldiers to be exact.
After a brief introduction into how those young girls became child soldiers, the documentary then began to focus on their rehabilitation. It is not as easy as one would think. In order to fully rehabilitate a female soldier, they need, depending on their experience, up to 8 years of therapy, 24 hours a day for 365 days of the year. That is 2,920 days, or 70,080 hours not including the two leap years.
The reason that it can take so much time is because the pain of what the young female soldiers have suffered is etched in their minds and souls. Rehabilitation could take longer if the young girls or women resist it. That is what made me think.
If those former child soldiers were willingly getting and accepting the help they were given, and they eventually become productive members of society, then what happens to the ones who aren’t offered, or willingly accept the help they so desperately need? Do they just continue with their lives as if nothing happened? Yes.
So let’s turn this around a bit. Let’s say, there is someone you know who needs help, but doesn’t think or believe that they do. Then what? That’s how this blog began. Someone told me about someone they know who needs, and quite possibly still needs help, but doesn’t want it. The reason for them not wanting to accept help is twofold.
The first is mentioned above. The second is that the individuals, who are trying to help this person, aren’t giving them the help that they truly need. I can say that because I’ve been in a similar plight when people were “supposedly helping me” but truly weren’t. When I was told about the situation I said, “You can’t really change that. The person needs to want help to begin with. You can tell them anything all you want.” And then I told them about the female child soldiers. What I didn’t fully tell them is that the help they are offering could be hindering everyone involved.
So who really need to change here? In my opinion, everyone who is trying to help and the person who needs it need help. Few of us are trained psychologists or psychiatrists. Fewer of us want to change because that would mean facing our inabilities, or demons. That can be painful. But just like everything else in life, people get through things and become better people if they want to. That means that when people who are trying to help someone help themselves, could generally use some help too. That also means that depending on the life experience, and the fact that we rarely have 24 hours a day for 365 days a year to deal with our emotions and the professional help to go along with that, it could take longer than anyone thought especially if everyone is hampering their own progress when they decide to be in denial. Denial, by the way, first causes internal and then external chaos which never ends well.
The point of today’s blog is this. Do you want to change your life? If so, do you know where to start? Better yet, do you have the guts to do it? Because you can’t really change that if you’re not willing to do deal with what is holding you back. Change is a relationship we have without ourselves and others. For anyone who doesn’t know what I mean, here is a link to Saturday’s blog, http://arebelsrant.com/the-work/
Thank you for reading A. Rebel’s Rant! ;D
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