I live in Jacksonville, Florida and today the Headmistress of a local private school was shot multiple times by an employee who was fired earlier this morning. Details are coming out little by little...as of right now, the teacher went home after he was fired, packed an AK-47 in a guitar case, went to the Headmistress's office, shot her then killed himself. It was chaos...parents rushed to the school to get their children but luckily, no students were hurt. There are a couple of mental health things I want to talk about in light of this event: work and how you handle tough situations.
The first thing I want to talk about is being fired. I was fired from a very good job. It sucked. I cried. I was in a financial crisis for a few years. HOWEVER I did not take out my negative emotions on anyone from my former employer. Despite all the bad things resulting from my getting fired, I always knew it was just a job...I could always get another one despite the bad economy at the time. People need to realize that work is NOT your everything! It should only be a part of your life. These days, people can lose their job at any time for any reason so you cannot take it so personally when you are fired after XX years and you put in 110% everyday and you love what you do. Life happens and you must be able to roll with it. People have been getting laid off and/or fired for a few years in this economical climate unfortunately it should be considered a norm at this point. When you're working, prepare for the worst...period. What is the point in harming your former boss? Feel better for a little bit...you're not going to get your job back...it's going to be business as usual at your former employer so why not go about yours?
Another thing I want to point out is that students said to the news that students made fun of this particular teacher because he was "different" and they didn't think he was a good teacher. I could say a lot but since the shooting happened a few hours ago and I don't condone what this man did today I'm not going to go there. I'm just going to say this: Be Kind. Always. You do not know what is going on inside a person's head, you do not know what they're going through outside of work/school/activity, you do not know how close they are to the edge. Therefore, ALWAYS BE KIND!
If you want to keep up with what's going on here's a link...
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