MURDER BY THOUGHT.

• Author: Clyde, Marianne
• Position: PSYCHOLOGY

THE SYMPTOMS of dis-ease never will disappear until we are brave, patient, and diligent enough to address the core issues that create the dis-ease. Various dictionaries describe this affliction as "a harmful development," "a particular quality, habit, or disposition regarded as adversely affecting a person or group of people," or "lack of ease."

If we do not confront the reason for the "harmful development" or "lack of ease," we never will solve the problem adequately. Perhaps we do need some reasonable measures to address gun control, terrorism, and the opioid crisis but, as Rev. Wesley Shortridge, pastor at Liberty Community Church in Bealeton, Va., said in a recent interview, "We have never been able to stop addiction by outlawing drugs." The same goes for guns, trucks, immigrants, and anything else.

We never will be able to overcome hate with hate and blame, or regulate mental health issues in such a way as to make everyone think and act in a sane way. Yes, reasonable regulations can help, but we never can achieve and agree on reasonable measures and regulations if we continue to be unreasonable.

As a therapist, I fully am aware that we never will be able to "fix" anyone else. We can provide education, compassion, and support, thus creating an environment in which people feel free to release old, unhealthy beliefs and rules that no longer work. This, though, never will occur as long as we, as individuals, deny our own responsibility to explore our own thought processes and continue to project dysfunction on others. Factionalizing groups of people by race, ideology, mental-health status, religion, or belief systems simply does not work.

After a heartbreaking incident like the church shooting by a terribly troubled person in Sutherland Springs, Texas, or a group of innocent people being massacred by a hate-filled man in a truck in New York, each of us is horrified and want to change things so it never happens again. Of course--that is an absolutely normal reaction to a frightening event.

This is not a time to politicize by blaming "Republicans" or "stupid gun owners," as was evidenced by ill-informed tweets as ways of expressing frustration. These kinds of tweets enhance division, insist that there only is one way to see things, and put up a wall of resistance to intelligent, informed, and compassionate solutions.

It must start by talking personal responsibility. There is an emptiness in each of us, longing for connection, love, and...