Nah… No! DON’T Go Around Breaking Stuff!

We all have our triggers. Something I read today provoked an inner sense of disgust, even though I know the motives behind what was written, and what was shared, seemed innocent enough.

Here is what was quoted; maybe I’m overthinking it:

“Don’t pretend.

Cry.

Scream.

Break a few things if you need to.

God is not afraid of your darkness.

Actually, the Spirit is masterful at creating from chaos.” (Carlos A. Rodriguez)

I get it. I understand what the author is trying to say. But I just can’t get past that middle sentence: sorry, it’s not okay to break stuff. The trouble is when we break stuff we break things of value, to us or to others or to us all, and sometimes when we break stuff, we break people.

And, am I allowed to say this, when people break stuff it’s scary. I know, I know, when we are in the darkness it is scary, but we don’t need to make it scarier for others than necessary. There are far more appropriate ways of finding solace in God, and finding a healing that only comes from God.

I wonder how many people read those words, and that sentence jumped out of them, because they have a background in family or domestic violence. I wonder just how many people have been traumatised by violence, because what is it that traumatises us? Violence!

People breaking stuff.

The general thrust of what the author is saying certainly has merit, but why give license to those who might weaponise their anger to promote their own ‘healing’, when that healing, done in this way, can potentially wreak havoc in lives around them; certainly in loved ones lives.

I have seen too many times people break stuff in anger only to regret it minutes later, and they spend months and even years repaying a debt they cannot afford to repay. What about those who have to repay others’ debts? I’ve seen people break ‘stuff’, and that stuff be people. One woman per week in Australia is broken; I don’t mean to the point of needing to be healed. One woman per week in Australia is permanently broken. Her life is ended. She has been killed. Because someone broke stuff!

It isn’t okay to say that maybe you should break some things if you need to. This plays far too much into the hands of our self-centred spirituality these days. When it’s all about me. I’m sorry, but if you need to to break stuff to feel better you’re doing it wrong. Sure, if we have broken stuff, and so many of us have in the past, we do pay the consequences, and beyond that need not feel guilty, given that paying the consequences should amend the guilt.

For the person reading this, especially the man, who has power to break stuff, to break human bodies, to destroy possessions, and to shed fear abroad in the lives of those close by, please do not go and break things ‘if you need to’.

You don’t need to.