GROUND ZER0, New York, N.Y.--Oct. 26, 2003-- As 50,000 acres ravenously burn both empty land and homes in San Diego, County, I think of the "brush fires of Terror" that sweep through so many peoples' lives.

     Underbrush is the key tinder to the formula of "Fires of Terror," whether they be physical conflagrations sweeping San Diego County, or, emotional brush fires burning with rage and anger within us all.
      Terror Thoughts are the tinder that sparks our Fear, Intimidation and Complacency into flames when we experience emotional brush fires, just as dry, knotted underbrush that accumulates over time becomes the fodder for earthly fires.   
      Like Nature's brush fires, Emotional Fires smolders deep down in our souls. The flickering flames choke off the sunlight, gagging us with the fumes of angers and regrets, or feelings of loneliness, emptiness, despair, failure or sometimes just simple, ugly resignation that we're a loser, or have been cast bad lots from the cruel hand of some faceless deity, a mean-spirited power, that has singled us out to be the victim in a game of crucification.
      Emotional brush fires scar our lives, just as Nature's fires scorch the mantle of Mother Earth, blackening all in their path.

        Young children are the most vulnerable victims of such emotional brush fires.    These vulnerable little ones are those who think they are not loved as much as they should be, or cared about as their friends are, or who think they are ugly, stupid, too poor, not liked, not popular, not as smart or lucky as other children.  They feel trapped in an emotional brushfire within their souls that burns and scalds and ultimately scars them into a state of Terrorism of life itself.
      They often take two pole positions in the drama of life itself.

      On one end of the spectrum, children abused by emotional brush fires that destroy their self worth become doormats--emotional wallpaper never standing up for themselves.  Many of these children chose to live in a state of constant denial of their own self values, denigrating themselves to the lowly position under the belief that everyone else is above them, and they are lowest step on the ladder.  They often become over eaters, recluses, shying away from a world that is jabbing hot pokers at them, reinforcing their worthlessness, their lack of value and importance.
      Opposite them are the boisterous, angry people who selfishly claim they are the hammer and everyone else is the nail.  Inside them rage emotional brush fires of similar nature, only instead of burying themselves in the ashes of the fires, such people become sparks, trying to revenge the world by setting the rest of it on fire.
       These people trod over others as bulls in a china closet, disregarding people's feelings, seeking their own self aggrandizement at the expense of anyone who stands in their way.   They become the trouble makers, the howlers, the screamers and often seeds of destruction.

       Ultimately, there is little difference between the two--the doormat and the braggadocio, self-seeking, self-centered egotist.    Both are convinced they are the center of the universe:  One is the doormat of the universe's entrance,  the other its axis.
      While their actions appear opposite, their motivation is exactly the same--protect themselves from anyone getting close to the source of the fires within--trust no one, believe in nothing except the victimization of self.
       Deep within both extremes of the "doormat" and "egotist,"  exists the tinder of human emotional brush fires.  Just about anything can set the fires within off.

        In San Diego County, the authorities suspect arson as the cause of starting Nature's brush fires.  But the primary problem was lack of "tender loving care."   The brush grew too long without being weeded, removed, trimmed.   Neglect created a "State of Terror."  Complacency to the laws of Nature by environmentalists kept the Sentinels of Brush Fire Vigilance at bay.  
       When I was a young man working in the Douglas Fir forests in Oregon, we set slash fires.   Such  fires were controlled, designed to remove the tinder from logging sections--"slash" is brush left in piles from logging-- that offered nests of danger that could ignite and burn down whole forests when the hot summers and thunderstorms appeared.
        In the fall, when the ground started to dampen and the fire threat was low, we set whole sections of the forest afire to burn away the tinder that might eat through the forest if a wildfire started.   We were Sentinels of Slash Vigilance...using fire to stop fire.    We were cleaning out the rubbish to reduce the danger.
        A more common example of the danger tinder represents is pilling up old rags in a closet, especially those soaked in cleaning fluids.   Spontaneous combustion can set them on fire, turning an old dusty pile of rags into a fiery time bomb.  

          Human emotions are not unlike the unmanaged brush or a pile of dirty rags commanding a corner of a dark closet.   If the tangles and roots of old limbs and roots are not cleansed in a controlled manner, a danger exists that an explosion or a raging fire might ignite.  The same is true of a pile of rags stuffed in a closet where there is little ventilation.
        Columbine High School was one example of human brush fires raging wildly within human environs.    The boys who fostered the hatred toward other students and society didn't just happen to wake up one day and decide to kill everyone in sight.   There were no Sentinels of Vigilance watching over their emotional "spontaneous combustion."   No one was Vigilant about their Beasts of Terror, aware that within each of them, as within us all, rests a pile of rags waiting for other rags to be tossed upon them until a trigger sparks them into raging flames.

        The Columbine Boys fed on Fear, Intimidation and Complacency--the Triads of Terrorism.    There was no controlled burning of their Emotional Terrorism by Courage, Conviction and Right Actions, for if there were, they would never design a plan to kill their classmates and teachers in random acts of revenge against not individuals, but against an unmanaged Beast Within.  A Beast seeks to make its host think he or she is a victim of life, who proliferates on a sense of alienation and self depreciation until one begins to believe the world is a sour grape and he or she forced to drink its bitter juice.
        Vigilant people, on the other hand, learn to refuse to be victims.
         Terror-driven people feed on victimization.
         Terrorism is devious.   It creeps into our souls like a cancer, perhaps a little thought at first that we're not as worthy as, as gifted as, as smart as, as fortunate as.  Or, it is imposed upon us by those we look to to shape our attitudes and outlooks.   Parents who neglect their children's defenses against Terrorism fuel the emotional brush fires.   They  let the TerrorThought grow within through neglect or Complacency.

          Children have little defense against a parent who is too busy to give them a hug in the morning and at night, a parent too concerned with himself or herself to tell them they love them or to stop what they are doing and sit with the child and build a bridge of trust so strong the child never needs to retreat into the caves of the Beast of Terror to hide the pain of life.
           Parenting is like land management.  One of the roles of the parent or guardian is to clean the brush from the child's soul, to thin it out so that Fear, Intimidation and Complacency don't choke the potential of the child to be strong and durable when the world's battering rams slam at his or her self worth, his or her sense of individuality, sense of community purpose, sense of value that he or she is a valuable, precious asset.
           Parents who recognize that life is full of pain, and, who understand the Beast of Terror stalks all children, are quick to become Sentinels of Vigilance in all their acts toward a child.

        They are like good land managers.  They see the tinder of Terrorism growing around the roots of the child.  They know that if the emotional underbrush grows too thick, without being burnt away, that there will be no new growth.  The child will become stuck in a rut.   The child will not evolve by learning how to remove the Fear, Intimidation and Complacency and grow in its place, Courage, Conviction and Right Actions that benefits future generations, specifically, the Children's Children's Children.

          As I watch the fires in San Diego County, I think of the fires that burn through life.   I think of how we, as Parents and Loved Ones of Vigilance must be fire wardens with our children and ourselves, always ready to remove the brush that can ignite, explode and rage throughout us if we don't treat it with respect.
           Human beings are garbage collectors.  We keep our emotional trash stored in a deep bin.   We often refuse to dump it.   We carry it around until one day it ignites, driving us into deep states of despair, or, in a more radical situation, into actions that may hurt us and others.
          The irritated mother who swings her hand harshly against a child's face, or yells, "Don't bother me!  Can't you see I'm busy..." forgets the child is burned by such rejection.  Deep scars form on the child's soul, just as they would occur if lit cigarettes were crushed on his or her nubile flesh.
         Vigilance tells us we must be careful to keep our children's Fears balanced with Courage, their Intimidations countered with Confidence, and their Complaciences managed with Right Actions for future generations.

        Brush fires on television are not just Nature's message to us that we need to keep the ground cleared or be threatened by Nature's wrath.
         Brush fires also remind us to clean out our emotional brush bins, to weed out the Terrorism within ourselves and those we love so we can protected from our own demons, from the wrath of Emotional Terrorism.
        You can fight those brush fires today.
        Take the Pledge of Vigilance.  Download it.  And use its power to clean out the emotional brush that may, if left unattended, one day explode.
       

Oct. 26--Marlins Spear Beast Of Baseball Terror At Yankee Stadium

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