Crowd Sourcing a Solution to Gun Control: Change Your Scope

I don’t know about you, but when I wake up the next morning after a mass shooting I note in my mind that, as soon as I can, I need to pull out a piece of paper and use a drawing technique to map out the little I understand about how these shootings continue to happen.

I crave to define the interrelationships — and especially all the points at which these events could have been stopped. It never feels easy, but the worst part is that this is an individual action, much like voting. I can affect only what is under my immediate control. I can only affect the people I interact with in my life.

Or maybe that’s not true at all. Humbly, I acknowledge my personal failure because there is more that I can do, surely. What I have done isn’t good enough. It probably never was, and it certainly isn’t now.

I retrained as a coach because I am constantly inspired by the incredible beauty, bravery, and potential of individual people inside of and outside of my practice.

So as I contemplate what is next — What is next for me? For the children? For the Black people who have been shot and killed and those who will yet be? For you? For the neighbor I don’t yet know or will never know— I think of my experience working with safety engineers in avionics and I wonder what human factors analysis they might do on this issue.

I think about chefs I have known — what recipes would they formulate to stop this senseless murder? I think of the rock and mountain climbers I’ve known, their playfulness and ability to suffer on the way to completing a challenging route or summit: If they were to fix this immense and serious problem, how would they do it? I know they can. I’ve seen what they can do.

I think of office workers who file and maintain the most elaborate of records and who can retrieve them with ease. Surely they know something about the importance of keeping and checking records and could make a difference here.

I think of our government agencies and companies who do background checks and pre-employment testing. I think of the individuals who pee in cups to ensure their opportunity to be hired under a federal contract.

I think of trainers I’ve known — in search and rescue, in wildland firefighting, in auto racing — their embrace of protocol, procedures, and why these are so important. Surely they know, too?

I think of music teachers, ice skating instructors, and people who grow cactus and flowers. Each one is caretaking about something. Even people who like and want easy access to guns know how to caretake and what it’s like to be taken care of — how important it is. How important it is to feel safe.

From my end of things I am asking, how are we going to solve this?

The fact is, I think we all know how to fix this problem. But just like in coaching, the path to what someone wants is never linear or laid straight out for the taking. We’ve tried that route using the usual methods — haven’t we? We’ve voted, we’ve protested, we’ve implored, we’ve asked, we’ve stood together — and cried together.

I know you see something you can do. Start talking about it. Start doing it.

Real change requires constant daily attention to try and try again. To know that each attempt — temporarily failed or productive — provides information that will, ultimately, create an amazing result.

And if you are one who is holding tightly onto the idea that you absolutely must have a powerful, self-carried, automatic death machine, please share a thoughtful essay about why this is the case. In any argument, the other side is at least 10 percent right. I believe that.

I ask though that you consider this in your response: If you want these guns you cannot use the argument that you are not like other gun owners. You cannot exclude yourself from a group that contains indivdiuals who will make the choice to kill children, teachers, other staff, Black people, grandmas, fathers, mothers, or law enforcement. In some areas of life I do think it’s possible to have your cake and eat it, too — but this is not one of them.

The real answer is that you, the one with the big bad gun who won’t kill children, who won’t kill other people needlessly — you must lead the effort in fixing this. You tell us how it can be that you can maintain access while ensuring harmful gun owners (or others with access to these guns) cannot. The statistics, the funerals, the mourning, the community sadness, the urgency of all of this — fix it. I know you can.