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A Reflection on the Georgia School Shooting ~

This morning, as my 18-year-old drove off to school, I found myself saying, “Be brave.”

It felt like a childlike thing to say to someone so determinedly stepping into adulthood, yet it lingered in the air as he disappeared from view. Afterward, I sat in my morning meditation, and a deeper contemplation arose, unraveling the words I had just spoken: Be brave.

We often speak of bravery as something to be attained, a force we must summon when we don’t feel resilient or particularly courageous. We often put bravery in the context of “You have to be Brave,” which means what exactly? That we don’t have it already?

It’s as if we believe bravery is something external we need to snatch and grab and pull into ourselves, or perhaps it’s internal but hidden deep within a darkly lit hallway, waiting behind a series of 100 closed doors that 30 years of psychotherapy won’t even open.

So, this morning, I changed “Be brave” to just its present participle: Braving. This changed things for me. When I said to myself, “You are braving,” there was a recognition that I was already standing in it. That the courage I needed was already present.

You might be asking, what was I braving for? I was braving to send my son to school this morning, knowing that just recently, another community was shattered by violence only thirty minutes from our home. Another place, another group of families, now forever changed — this time, the community surrounding Apalachee High School in Winder, GA. And though my son is now a legalized adult, I am still left with that ache of helplessness, not knowing how to protect him, how to ensure his safety in a world where no such guarantees exist.

In moments like these, the heart contracts in fear, yet we are asked to stand firm in our uncertainty. Or to compartmentalize and just not deal with it right now. I mean, what exactly can we do when the whole illusion of control crumbles, and what remains is the raw truth: we cannot shelter those we love from the unpredictability of life?

This is the paradox: to live in a world where we cannot always keep our children safe and yet to find within ourselves the strength to send them out into it anyway. It is the braving of love, the willingness to stand in fear, and to continue forward, trusting that our steadfastness will make a difference, even when the world feels unsteady beneath our feet.

Is this a fool’s journey? To stand in the unbearable stillness of helplessness when every part of me longs for action, for doing something, anything. What is there to do in the face of this but to call up the NRA and demand they knock it off? But even that feels futile, a shout into the void.

So here I am, starting with this — an expression of my emotions in a post. It seems simple enough, yet it’s also deeply uncomfortable. To sit with the feelings rather than rush to fix or fight.

Maybe the fool’s journey isn’t in standing still, but in believing that frantic action will somehow shield us from the pain. Perhaps the wisest thing we can do in times like this is to bravely face the discomfort, to let it open us, rather than harden us. To trust that even in our helplessness, we are not powerless, and that by allowing ourselves to feel, we can find the clarity for what comes next.

I told myself again not to be brave, but to stand in Braving. Tadasana, strong mountain pose.

My son and I decided that we would not collapse into the defeated posturing of helplessness. And instead, we were going to brave our day ahead.

Bravery, as I reflected, isn’t about effort. It’s not about trying harder or forcing ourselves into a state we don’t authentically feel. The trying itself can become a burden, creating a false sense of striving that wears us down. It is the effort to try to be brave that exhausts us and makes it feel insurmountable. Yoda got this spectacularly right, “Do or do not. There is no try.” But when we simply stand — when we are already braving — we align with a deeper sense of resilience and strength that is already within us. There is nothing more to do but remain.

Stand braving in a strong Tadasana Mountain Pose until a clear view of what to do arises. I will not react out of a destabilized and disembodied fury of outrage, vengeance, or hate. That is not the solution when we are facing pain and suffering.

In the wake of yet another school shooting, the weight of suffering feels unbearable, impossible even. It’s tempting to collapse into hopelessness, to feel as though we are helpless to stop this cycle of violence. But now, more than ever, we need to be braving — not just reacting, but standing unwavering in the face of what is hard, in the face of our grief, our confusion, and the collective pain that echoes through the families and communities affected by such senseless tragedy.

Braving is to hold the immense suffering, not turn away from it. Not compartmentalize it to go on in denial. It’s to face what feels unfaceable and to trust that in doing so, we can hold steady long enough for clarity to emerge. We don’t need to rush to action or force solutions before we have truly allowed ourselves to stand in the reality of what has happened. Braving, in this sense, is about being fully present in our experience, our pain, and our frustration at the seeming lack of change in this gun-toting country.

Stand tall in Tadasana, braving with me and my son. In the midst of pain and suffering, there may be nothing more powerful than a community standing as one, united in shared courage. True unity is unwavering, a force beyond reckoning. Together, as we brave this moment, we create the space for deeper action to arise — not from chaos, but from stillness. There is a quiet, profound power in refusing to be defeated by the weight of it all.

Braving isn’t a passive stance; it is a force, a quiet revolution. It is an action everyone can take, even when we don’t quite know what to do yet. We can cultivate change even if, at first, all we can do is stand in our discomfort. This is braving. This is our reminder that we are strong enough to face this hard, hard reality and that total transformation and change are always possible — even when our only act is to brave the storm standing together.

Let us walk together, braving all that hurts, all that feels impossible, trusting that by standing in our braving selves, we will find the strength to meet whatever right action comes next. My great teacher, Pema Chodron, would remind us that it’s in these moments of groundlessness that we are invited to be fully present, to brave the unknown with open hearts despite the immense vulnerability it requires.

I say today; we don’t have to Be Brave when we already are Braving it all.

~

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