We are spiraling. We are drowning. We are blinded by the harsh light of reluctance. We choose complacency over change and comfort over the scratchy-sweater need for action. We scream and shout. We seethe and shoot. The pressure release valves are clogged with the muck of a million excuses. The desire to heal is buried beneath a sea of social media distractions and disconnections.

We are mentally ill.

It’s time to admit that no thoughts or prayers or patience or compassion or tears or sympathy or best wishes will fix this collective broken bicycle.

We can blame it on genetics, parenting, toxicity, education, or bad luck. But it’s blatantly obvious to anyone still awake enough to see through the fog of this modern zombie society. We are walking around this planet with faulty wiring and a gross inability to solder the severed connections.

The glue is all gone and the pieces of our sanity are strewn across the floor like the remnants of a shattered cookie jar at the slippery hands of an overeager toddler. Yet we continue to think that the cracks will magically mend if we just cross our fingers tightly and pray for better days.

It’s imperative we travel upstream to see what’s been constantly poisoning the river instead of simply building dams to keep it from seeping into our pipes.

Soon no spaces will be safe. The mundane will turn murderous, the banal brutal. The seemingly innocuous daily activities will be weighed down with a constant head-on-a-swivel sense of mistrust and nervous agitation.

Each subsequent generation will be forced to live under the heft of unbearable levels of sustained insecurity. The already spiked national stress numbers will become incalculable. Drug abuse will numb the sounds of incessant mental static and we will retreat into caves of isolation simply to survive.

Or we can stop the cycle. Rediscover our common sense. Recognize the patterns. Remove the blinders. Wipe the blood from the money. Treat the roots to save the tree. Prioritize effort over promises. Engage the brakes to slow the train.

Admit that we were very very wrong.

Adolescence Interrupted