My son was driving me home from the airport. It was late and cold. Suddenly I was aware of this haunting music on the radio and that he was singing. It has become one very important song to me, and I want you to hear it. Click on THIS LINK and listen to Sunrise, by the group Our Last Night.
I’ve listened to it many times since our ride home that night. It makes me cry every time. The depth of sadness and human suffering that children and teens go through when they are bullied is staggering. There are few adults reading this who have not also experienced some aspect of bullying. Here’s breakthrough message: you can make it to the sunrise! Yes, YOU can make it to the sunrise!
There are these moments when we feel that we just cannot endure any longer. And yet! If we endure for one more minute, that makes making it for the next minute easier. Before long, we have reached through the long night, and it is sunrise! Light dawns! We can see our way more clearly! We can breathe freely! That experience makes facing the next night a little easier.
There are people today, young people and not so young people, who are still caught in the hole, still believing all those negative, bullying voices in their heads who have no one calling them to the next sunrise.
Who do you know that needs to hear this message? Who needs to be challenged to make it to the sunrise? Is it you? Is it a neighbor? Is it a kid on your street? A friend? An enemy? If someone comes to mind, encourage them to make it to the sunrise. Send them the video. Call them. Tell them your story–how you made it to the sunrise and why that matters. Affirm for them the final and best words of this song:
“I won’t go to my grave until a difference is made.”
Every life makes a difference. Every birth. Every birth gives way to the next sunrise.
Bob Patrick
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This song is so powerful! The sentiments it contains can be identified with so many things – bullying, certainly (as that’s the point), but also depression, addiction, emotional/physical/sexual abuse… So resonant.
As to bullying, I am still in awe of the fact that so many people see it as “not a big deal”, and merely a “rite of passage”. I applaud this group for standing up so eloquently and speaking (singing) out to offer victims a ray of hope. Simply beautiful.
When I was growing up, the people who bullied me most were my siblings. I think there was definitely an attitude that this was normal sibling behavior … perhaps part of that “rite of passage” mentality. But reading Stephen Covey’s 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families offers another possibility of families having a clear sense if purpose and mission guided by a covenant. I think families can and ought to be the most affirming environments for children, not the environment for “toughening them up.” Maybe a workshop for families on the 7 steps would be of interest to some folks.
Bob, thank you for this reflection and the link to the video. Very moving, relevant and inspiring.
At the end of the video the performers talk with the founder (?) of The Bully Project. I have a Bully Project kit in my office awaiting the right circumstances (timing, interest, volunteer leadership) for our congregation to engage with the project. This inspires me to focus my energy on creating those circumstances to engage. Thank you.
In our shared faith…
~)<
Reverend Jan