This is a picture of Neville Longbottom standing between the Death Eaters and the children... alone. Beaten. Bleeding. Bereaving his friends who died the night before. Being the first--and the only--to step up and oppose the Dark Lord.
Brave.
When I start writing young adult fiction next year, I am going to dedicate my first book to him because he is one of the greatest #HopeGivers I've ever known.
We tell our children to stand up for what is right--even if they're standing alone. And that's where we leave it... an empty platitude that sounds inspiring but doesn't prepare them or equip them to execute such a lofty admonition.
We don't tell them how. We don't show them how. (Are you kidding me? A person could get hurt doing that, right?)
We are such strange, sad creatures sometimes.
You're darn straight a person could get hurt standing up for what is right. As Dumbledore said, “We must all face the choice between what is right and what is easy.”
And if we do muster up the courage to do what is right instead of what is easy, we will likely find ourselves standing alone... utterly.
That's the part we leave out when we instruct our children to do what's right. Here is what really happens if you decide to 'take a stand':
~ You can stand up for what is right and be a hero, but you could be a hero walking around with a black eye.
~ You could be shunned.
~ You could lose friends.
~ You will almost assuredly be threatened. Count on that.
~ You will be ridiculed and scoffed at
~ You will be ignored and dismissed.
~ You will be met with every kind of resistance imaginable.
Evil is not just going to lie down and slither away because you took a stand. But here is what we can also learn from Neville Longbottom:
You are more powerful than you know, and they fear the day you discover it.
You know what happens right after you are shunned? When your friendships are strained or your friends walk away from you altogether? After you've been threatened, ridiculed, ignored, and dismissed?
You get up the next morning, and you can look yourself in the mirror. You know that even though you're standing in the middle of a shit-storm, when you are truly standing between the Death Eaters and the children, everything that is good and right and just is standing with you.
Thou Mayest.
And you will find other #HopeGivers. You will. We're all out there looking for each other, and we are finding each other, and we are changing the world. Sometimes we're bleeding... stumbling about... concussed... but we are here, cutting the heads off of snakes.
#HopeIsHere -- WE BRING IT!
Do not be afraid.
Daisy Rain Martin is an author, speaker, advocate, and educator as well as a founding member of The Flying M-Inklings Writing Group. She lives with her husband, Sean-Martin, in the beautiful state of Idaho and teaches English and Literature during the school year to the best 7th graders the world over. Daisy spends her summers writing, speaking, researching, creating, gardening, and canning.
Hope Givers: Hope is Here, is the sequel, of sorts, to her comedic, spiritual memoir, Juxtaposed: Finding Sanctuary on the Outside, which was her publisher's (Christopher Matthews) #1 top selling book in 2012. She has also written a free e-book for anyone who has or is currently being sexually abused called, If It’s Happened to You, which appears in its entirety in Hope Givers. Please follow her weekly blog, SATURDAISIES, which addresses a plethora of current issues including child advocacy, all things hilarious, and matters of the heart. She would love for you to join the Rainy Dais Community by friending her on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
No comments:
Post a Comment