Mental Health Matters - "To be, or not to be..."

Woo, that was interesting. All right, there's a way longer lag between StreamYard and the actual live. So now I know when I ask you questions, I gotta give you a lot longer to respond, reply than I think. All right. Hi everybody. Welcome to Mental Health Matters, formerly Suicide Prevention Saturday. My name is Brooke Cheney. I am the owner here at A Great Start Shooting School. Up there in the corner too. Um, and why are we here? Because we know 2 of every 3 gun deaths you hear about are suicides. And if we want to save lives, we must talk about mental health. We must talk about suicide prevention. Bonus for those of you who are caring about the violence in the world: when we talk about mental health and talk about that in general, we can also reduce violence. So, Gunpowder Beauty, how are you? Um, it's, uh, yeah, hey y'all is— I— there's, um, a Luke Bryan thing and it's a country girl, and, uh, in there one of the models says hey y'all, and that's what I hear whenever I read that now. But anywho, um, hello Mike. I do have DJ here with me, but I saw some of y'all were here, so I'm just gonna say hi to everybody and then I'm gonna start ignoring what's over here. Oh wait, I said that, that's not as exciting. I know what the— the turtle was here and Mr. Gun Websites was number one, a thumbs up, shared, and thanked me for hosting every week. So, um, I was thinking about that today on our interesting day that we had here at A Great Start Shooting School. And, um, 2018 was the first one of these on Facebook. And I know some of you guys, like, not G Web so much, but I know Hillbilly, um, and, and Barbecue used to number their shows. And I'm thinking, what is 52 times since 2018? So I don't know what that is. If y'all want to do math, let me know. But for right now, I am gonna do that thing and push the buttons. DJ got a new platform, so DJ is here in voice only tonight. DJ, feel free to say hi to everybody.

Hello everyone.

Yes, so DJ's got new, new software, and so I get to do more stuff. So hopefully I won't hang up on y'all. That's, that's my plan. So if anything goes wrong, it is not his fault, just so we're clear. All right, DJ, who is the guitar player that is your icon?

That's the— that's Derry from, uh, Honeymoon Suite. That's photo courtesy— needs to go to Guns and Barbecue.

Oh, okay. All right, because I feel as though my life is more complete now that I've seen Angus Young live and in person and gotten to listen to a 25-minute solo from him at 77 years old.

Incredible. It was so bad you got to go to that show. AC/DC is one of those bucket list bands, should be for most rock and roll fans at least. Yeah, incredible that you got to have that experience.

I mean, one of my first, first, first albums ever listened to. I can tell you that I was in Thornton, New Hampshire. I was at Larry Eno's house, and we were listening to the cassette tape of Dirty Deeds. And that was the first album that I ever learned or knew the name of or knew the band of. So they're sort of like my first loves, quite honestly, my first rock and roll experience. So that was very awesome.

A good one to have for sure.

Yeah. All right. Okay. So DJ's gonna pay attention to who's here and who's making comments, and I'm gonna try to stay on track cuz y'all know I am good with that for about the first 5, 10 minutes, maybe. Stuff below here, if you are in crisis, we talk about mental health. Great. What happens when it's not Saturday night or you've already watched all the reruns and you need someone? Who can help you? 988 will give you resources, 1-800-273-TALK. And you don't want to talk to anybody? Texting. Oh, for those teens out there, uh, 741741. So, okay, to be or not to be, that is the question. DJ and I were talking earlier this week and One of the things that is super duper important about our mental health, the most valuable resource you and I have exactly the same amount, not looks, no, no, not clothing, not beautiful pink things, no, that's not what you and I have exactly the same amount of, no matter who you are, no matter where you are, the most valuable resource you and I have is our time. So when I thought about the quote, "To be or not to be," from Shakespeare, Hamlet, for those of you who are scratching your head knowing I've heard this before, but I don't know where, because I have not, not jokingly, I had to look it up because I'm like, which play was that? Because I had an amazing freshman English teacher and made me love Shakespeare. Doesn't mean I remember the details. So time management and to be and not to be. Here's the deal. Our most precious resource, your time, my time. So when I get on here every Saturday night, I am choosing what I'm doing with my time because this is important to me to talk to you guys. You guys, you guys give me goosebumps. You guys choose to be here as well because this is important to you. And, and so that is really awesome. And then for those of you watching the replay, you all are still awesome because then you leave more comments below after the replay. So that helps me out as well, and I get to respond to those in sort of-ish real time. So also helpful. Jamie, DJ, Hillbilly, G-Webs, all you guys give so much time to the YouTube, to the social media, um, writing, tracking with Charlie, all of that. So time is our most resource. Most precious resource. So get to the point, Brooke, stop saying the same thing over and over again. To be or not to be, choose the things that you're spending your time with carefully. Most of us in today's day and age can easily get sucked up in this sucker, right? Handy dandy little all-you-can-eat tool of social media, and little shorts and little things are supposed to grab your attention. And this is part of why when I started, this was only a 5 or 10 minute show because I didn't want to be here longer than that. And honestly, when I'm surfing, I don't have much more of an attention span than that. So time management is where we pay attention to what we're doing. For those of you who have ever been introduced to meditation, like Mark Thomas, I think you and I have talked about this before. If you're out there watching the replay, let me know. And meditation, one of the things they say about meditation is if you are too busy to meditate for 5 minutes, you need to meditate for an hour. In that, you and I need to make our calm and our quiet time a priority. For those of you who know, I just got back from Japan. I say just, but it's been 2 weeks now. And one of the pictures, because DJ talked about this too, one of the pictures is a picture of my son walking along the beach at our, at our hotel. And walks along the beach are one of those things to me, like meditation. You're out there, you're by yourself, you are listening to the waves lap in, you are paying attention to whatever you're paying attention to. But it's quiet time. It's like a meditation. So guard your time. It is the resource. And for me, Japan was that reset thing. I got to guard my time for 2 full weeks where all I did was pay attention to my husband, my son, and my daughter. No phone, no text, um, very little email because I still had to take care of a couple things with my mom. I'd offloaded most of it, not badly, But to have that time and realize it's like we have finite time with those who we love, and we need to make sure that we love ourselves enough to give ourselves that time. Uh, we had a lovely rainy Thursday, and for those who don't know, here at The Great Surf Shooting School, we have an outdoor range. And one of my first students of the day, I said, well, we can go shoot in the rain. And shooting in the rain builds character, or I won't charge you, but you can just stop by, we'll have tea and cookies, and that will build your waistline. She opted for tea and cookies. So, um, but we got to, to, uh, hang out together, and she and I have similar goals, and we were talking about physical fitness, and I'm like, all right, let's go. And literally we hopped off my couch and we did a plank for 30 seconds. Because right now is the best time for you to decide you're going to do something for you right now. So my hope is you are here watching this to learn something that will help you. And then once we help ourselves, that's when we get to help others. And that was our tea and cookies conversation for the most part. All right. Now, for those of you who are here waiting to hear your names, and I know DJ is there, waiting to say hi to y'all. So, Mr. DJ, if you'd like, have your list. I'll click on the thing that puts you up, and then you can talk to everybody.

Uh, this is awesome. Like, you're doing the switching, you did the switching, and then I did the switching, and now you're back to doing the switching. But I do want to switch back to being able to do the switching, because doing the switching is something that— well, we just got to switch.

Okay.

Gun Websites is out there, so is the Crappy Turtle. Chris Broncato, the Atomic Funk, has joined us, so is Mike Ballinger. Gunpowder Beauty's out there, so is Patriot in the Dark. Gizzard Gary's in the room. Guns and Barbecues out there, and most recently Viejo. Good to see you, man. He's out there saying, hey gang.

Very nice, very nice. Yes, it is the ultimate switcheroo, without a doubt. I'm sorry, speaking of that, yeah, I gotta pull myself back up. Well, the good news is at least I know where the buttons are, um, but it is usually better if I don't have to because I do think a little bit better— bit, bit, bitter batter. Yeah, you know, that tongue twister thing. Betty had a bit of batter butter, bitter butter. Yeah. Anyway, I'll stop that right now. So yes, peanut butter jelly is always one of my favorite things, and I say that often. All right, so to be or not to be. Now let's actually talk about Hamlet. So to be or not to be is a quick, short little thing that one DJ and I were talking about. We were talking about time management because I get to choose which things I say yes to and which things I say no to.. And having 2 weeks off of not having to make any of those decisions is very refreshing because having blocked off that time and not had anybody asking me for anything for 2 full weeks, well, that was amazing. Now I know most of us don't have time. First time in my life I've ever been able to do that. And I am 54 currently. And it's one of those things where I'm like, okay, I don't know how old you are. I'm not asking for y'all to tell me how old you are, but, um, I feel though I've learned a lot and I'm starting to actually appreciate and understand the things I'm learning. So to be or not to be is that simple thing that is helping me remember, do I want to do this? Is it worth my time? And if it's not, it's okay to say no. I was reading one of my friends' thing and The thing that she, she wrote a whole big thing and she's like, no is a complete sentence. And I thought that was awesome because so often we want to take care of everyone. We want to say, yes, of course I can do that. Oh wait, there's space on my calendar. Yes, I can do it. I am so guilty of that. So, um, Yeah, so Gunpowder Beauty and I might be close in age because yes, Blockbuster was a thing long ago and far away. I might be older though, because I was before there was a Blockbuster. But anyhow, yeah, back to choosing your time. Oh yeah, sorry, back to Hamlet for real. So to be or not to be. So here's where it actually really and truly fits into mental health matters and suicide prevention. Because Hamlet is really having this conversation of, should I live or should I die? And what happens after death? And well, life is hard and there are struggles, and perhaps death is easier, but I don't know because I've never experienced death. And, um, Sorry, I made them— see, I, I had— I'd block these and then, um, this is always an AI DJ. Play nice theme version, respond to text. Uh-oh, does that mean you're in the— anyway, um, maybe he doesn't have a phone anymore. Maybe that's it. Uh, where is he? Mr. Gizzard Gary says Eisenhower administration days old born. Yeah, see, if I knew my math, my math— if I knew my English, English history better, Wow, if I knew words better, I could do the math. There we go. All right, so Hamlet's talking about death and suicide for real in this. So suicide is nothing new. The idea behind it, the reasoning behind it, it's like, I am suffering, life is hard, is death easier? Is the question he is asking. Now, DJ, this is where you're welcome to hop in at any point in time because I know you know the plays because you're that classically trained dude. Um, but it's just like when we're talking about life and death, when we know someone who commits suicide and we don't understand, it's just like, it's because life is hard and sometimes you run up, run out of that ability to fight it further. Actually, I want to go back up to the comments because in the beginning, Mr. Ballinger said you can change or stay the same, and Mike is there enjoying life. And everybody can say happy birthday to Mike. It was earlier this week, but for those of you who aren't on Facebook, you can't wish him happy birthday over there, so you can wish him happy birthday over here. So to be or not to be, right? So essentially, Hamlet's asking, I can change or I can stay the same. I can continue to suffer or I can take my life and maybe I won't suffer, but I don't know, maybe I'm going straight to hell and maybe I will suffer even worse. So, oh yeah, see, now that I went back up, I'm going to let you know, honey, I did not cut my hair. I just threw it all up behind my head. So, um, yeah, no, Sean likes long hair. I came home once with short hair like this because I went to a fashion show where they cut my hair on stage. Uh, I was a hair model, right? And he was not pleased. So yes, I will, I will have long hair as long as I am married, chances are, or as long as it will continue to grow. So, all right, that's kind of what I got for you guys tonight. DJ, oh, you want to see? All right, I gotta show you now. DJ, we talked about this, uh, a couple more there's, there's more pictures, right? We're gonna just kind of roll pictures in here.

Yeah.

So, uh, here is— and this just made me laugh because I didn't click on this by— I clicked on it by accident. But one of the things my family has always done— so when my kids were little, my husband traveled all the time, and my daughter would give him one of her stuffed animals. And so wherever her father would go, he would send a picture of the stuffed animal home so she could see that dad wasn't alone and wasn't sad. And so, um, now it's habit when we go, uh, anywhere that there's always going to be pictures of stuffed animals on our trip. So that is why we have stuffed animal pictures. All right, DJ, what kind of pictures do you want to see now? Um, things, uh, nature, or, um, city?

City and nature, one of each, or more?

And nature. All right, so, uh, here is view from our hotel, uh, in Hiroshima. The island you see in the distance is the one where we went to, to see the Shinto shrine. Um, so there is that. And it takes me a second to get back in here. Then city— oh, sorry, and when I say Shinto shrine, I showed you guys this last week, but the, the island you're looking at is the one that has the torii, this giant torii gate that sits out on the Ocean. And, oh, back to city. I have to go a little bit further because, yeah, video games. Oh wait, no, no, it's social media. So social media requires that we always just have food pictures, right? Is that not one of the social media requirements, is we must have food pictures? So, um, and that is that.

Um, oh, but wait, gun websites ask for a food pic, so—

oh, excellent. Oh wait, there it is. Absolutely. So yes, so ramen was probably the most common thing that we ate on a regular basis. Uh, as far as I can tell, my children and my husband could just eat ramen all the time. Uh, I, on the other hand, I was just like, yep, it's nice once in a while. Um, And Patriot in the Dark, I just talked about taking pictures of my daughter's stuffed animals to send her in college. Yeah, so you can do the stuffed animal thing in reverse. Uh, that would totally work, without a doubt. And, um, sorry, now we're gonna go on this. Oh, this one is all right. This one cracks me up, so hopefully this is funny for you guys too. So back in college when I met my husband, Street Fighter was the game. And I forget which, uh, platform it was on, but my husband had the edition where he had the actual console, but he had the controllers like in the video games, and he would play Street Fighter. Well, Sean's playing Street Fighter, Max, my son, is there, and Nadia as well, and I don't know where I was. And they're playing and these kids walk up to the game that Sean's playing and, you know, they're 17, 20-year-old kids. And Max is like, oh, Dad, you're going down. So Sean got to play these two kids and, or I guess the kid right next to it. And he posted up on Facebook, the kid I crushed, because Sean did win. 'cause he literally had a second degree in Street Fighter after, by the time we were actually out of college. So this picture cracks me up because the kids told me the story behind it and dad did win and the kids were surprised that some younger kids did not win when it came to playing video games. So, 'cause video games are definitely not my forte. So, All right, what else? Uh, so you said city, right, DJ? I did. Okay, so this is in the middle of the city. This is in the middle of our hotel. Uh, this— where are we? Um, this is Kyoto. Uh, the hotel we stayed at Kyoto. So, um, there is water everywhere. If you got up nice and early, which we did because we were still not quite, uh, down with the time change, so I'd be up at like 6 or 7 and all the fountains and everything were off and it was really quiet. And then at like 7 o'clock it would all turn on and it would start moving again. So there are a couple of the Japan pics. Like I said, I don't want to do a whole ton of them all at once because I don't know, other people's stuff can be boring when you haven't been on that. Um, all right, let's see. Mr. Gary, happy Mother's Day to all the mothers out there. Yes, please. That's lovely. Um, another funny thing with my kids. So we're bringing Nadia's home friend home tonight, and we stopped at the grocery store, and I'm just like, Nadia, we've got two silver vases. Go in get a bunch of flowers for Grandma and a bunch of flowers for the, the two grandmas because Shawn's gonna go see his mom and my mom's going over for dinner tomorrow night. So my 17-year-old daughter, I say a bunch, right? So I'm thinking, you know, the wrapped ones in a bunch because we already have the, the vase. Well, apparently my daughter thought the vases were really big because she came out. She literally has an armload of flowers for Mother's Day to split up into these little tiny vases that I have at home. And so for the rest of the evening thus far, we have discussed, um, figuring out, uh, what a bunch actually means to different people. So in the car, we had 3 people: Nadia, says a bunch is a lot of bundles of or sets of flowers. When I said a bunch, I just meant one of the little pre-packaged things that would fit in the vase. Lucas, who is the other person in the car with us, said 5 or 6 is a bunch. So I will poll the, the audience here. I'll start with DJ though. Uh, DJ, if someone told you get a bunch of flowers, How much do you think you'd get?

A handful.

A handful, right?

Yeah, actually, the, the sleeves that you're talking about, I mean, I'm referencing those that I see when I go into a grocery store and pass them. When you're talking like between $5 and $10 and that would be half a dozen to 8, 9 stems kind of thing, that's a little— that's kind of a slim bunch. Okay, it's not a very generous bunch, but I would still consider that to be a bunch. Put 2 of them together That's a bunch, right? Well, and that's what Chris Brancato, uh, has out there at one pack.

No doubt, right? That is like— Donnie said they're a bouquet. I should have asked for a bouquet, two bouquets, one for each of the bases. And I'm just like, okay. So yeah, so that means the funny part. Um, I like Patriot talking about, um, Shakespeare. Don't trust any guy that wears lacy collars. It's okay. Um, yeah, there's way worse things about back then. Uh, Patriot, I am on the same countdown-ish. I actually don't know which day my son goes off to college, so I don't know how many days I have. But even with my 17-year-old, she's a junior in high school, and I'm like, all I have is time to spend with her. Um, so do the best that we can to be present and aware of how we're spending the time. And I don't know, that is what I have for you guys tonight. Am I missing anything?

Yeah, Patriot has some good advice by his tendency. He says, I tend to overdo it. I think that's the better side to be on than that whole just get one, one bunch.

Gotcha, gotcha. Well, I gotta tell you, my van smells lovely. It sounds like— smells like a florist shop right now, so I got that going for me.

And I like the way Gun Websites parsed it out for us. He says a couple equals 2, a few equals 3 or 4, some is 5 or 6, bunch 7 or 8, many equals 10 or more. Okay, we're at 7 or 8 with the bunch. I think that's pretty, that's pretty solid for— and also would represent a bouquet as well.

Yeah, unfortunately we've already pulled them out and put them in their races and stuff, but I should have taken a picture. Of her coming out of the grocery store with her arms around all of the flowers. So, um, but you know, the grandparents will get their flowers tomorrow, so that is good.

Um, I really appreciate her optimism as well. Yeah, I get all parts of that errand. And, and if she came out with a smile, I'm sure that she was wearing it as she was selecting them too. So yeah, that's pretty— that's some wholesome stuff there, Brooke.

Yeah, well, I mean, the rest of So we were about 15 minutes away from bringing her friend home and I'm like, so they're in the back and I was taking the bunches of flowers from her and putting them on the seat next to me in the front of the car so that they weren't on the floor, so they weren't getting the heat blowing on them. And I'm driving and I look over and I'm driving and I'm just smiling. Like I'm facing forward. I look over, Nadie's like, stop. And I'm like, what? It's a lot. It's like, So yeah, it really— it's, it's that I will, I will at least take pictures of all of the flowers because she's currently up there cutting them and putting them in vases, the ones that are staying, because I did the ones for the grandmas already. But, um, yeah, I'll take pictures so y'all can see. So next week you'll get to see what that looks like. All right, sir, it is 27 minutes here. Garage Guy, uh, and a couple other folks that are here, I am guessing, are going to be heading over, if they are not already, to the green room. Over for Hillbilly at his, uh, at the top of the hour. Hillbilly starts around the top of the hour or quarter after-ish or so. Um, so go check out his channel. If you don't know, Friday nights is Georgia Shooting Connection. Uh, Jamie, I haven't seen him in here tonight, but he is often here. And then, oh my goodness, my bud, uh, Barbecue, I have not actually returned any of your texts or talked to you lately. Uh, barbecue's got something new going on and I forget what it is. So, um, next week he'll remind me before I come in so we can talk about that as well. All right, Mr. DJ, would you like to say thank you to all who showed and all the stuff you do when we leave?

I would. And Gary had a reminder out there, um, after a fashion, by, uh, wanting all the mothers to have a happy Mother's Day. Remember, that is tomorrow. So, uh, Reach out if you haven't in a while. If you do every day, it doesn't make a difference. Tomorrow is one of those days. Do not forget. And don't, like, worry about maybe even overdoing it a bit. I think that Patriot Nadia and I are chummy on that point, and I think that your mother or someone else that you want to honor on that day would feel well respected and well remembered if you were to do the same. So the phone call will do it. I want everybody to bring a friend next week. We've been a little thin on the friends coming in on a Saturday night, and I understand that it might be a little difficult to do that. I do appreciate everybody that showed up tonight and everybody that will be out there in the replay joining us this evening for the live show. We had Garage Guy 879, Viejo was in the room, so was Guns and Barbecue, Gizzard Gary, Patriot in the Dark, Gunpowder Beauty, Mike Ballinger, Chris Bronkout of the Atomic Punk, Crabby Turtle, and Gun Websites. So have a great week, everyone. Be safe. Have fun, take care of your crew and yourself, and rock! We're out.