In this roughly ten‑minute solo livestream, Brooke Cheney, owner and instructor of A Great Start Shooting School, continues her recurring "Suicide Prevention Saturday" series. She explains why she posts on YouTube (to reach people who can’t find the Facebook series) and shares her personal struggles with depression, anxiety, and social anxiety. The core message is the "eat an elephant one bite at a time" metaphor: when problems feel overwhelming, break them into small, manageable steps. She normalizes the idea that nobody truly has their life together, emphasizing that social media often hides struggles. Brooke offers practical resources—QPR (Question, Pause, Respond) training, the 211 hotline, the national suicide hotline, and texting options—and discusses the perspective of survivors left behind after a suicide. She also outlines a daily resilience practice she calls the "Power of 3": setting a morning intention and ending the day with gratitude prayers. The video ends with a brief recap of key take‑aways and an invitation for viewers to send questions.
Chapters
All right, so I'm doing the fancy thing here in my office again. So I actually have two cameras, so I'm not quite sure where to look exactly. So I'm just gonna sit back, and I know it just sort of looks like I'm a talking head, but I don't know, it's the only way I could do it. I think that's as high as my seat goes. Oh, that goes down. Hold on, I'll try to go back up. So anyway, hi, Saturday. Yes, it's currently Saturday. And it is actually Saturday on a Suicide Prevention Saturday. Saturday. Yeah. I'm going to say Saturday one more time just because I think I look really weird on Facebook because I just look like a talking head. Anyway. Hi, John, how are you? Um, so I'm doing Facebook and YouTube because I find Facebook is a pain in the neck kind of. So when you go to look for Suicide Prevention Saturdays, you can't find them because you sort of have to search and scroll down and all that sort of stuff. So I'm doing them on YouTube when I'm home. I can't do it while I'm traveling because I don't have two phones to do that with. So for those of you who share my stuff— hey Casey! Um, the YouTube channel is a good place to go. It doesn't have all of them, but it has some of them. Hi George! So anywho, all right, so Suicide Prevention Saturday. Hi for those of you who've never seen me before. My name is Brooke Cheney, and I am the owner and instructor here at A Great Start Shooting School, and I do Suicide Prevention Saturdays because suicide sucks and nobody wants to talk about it. So I'm talking about it because I can talk about things that suck, because we all can. We just are usually too polite to do so because suicide sucks, and talking about stuff that sucks is not necessarily, you know, the thing that you do at parties, although apparently I do. And I was actually, uh, last month— hey Nick, how are you? Um, uh, sorry. Oh well, yeah, see, a friend of mine— not a friend of mine, one of the other guys I watch on YouTube and Facebook— he always like, yeah, I can't look at the, the, um, all the comments coming in because it's like, oh, squirrel. So, all right, so back to things that suck. Life sucks. Life is hard. Nobody has all their stuff together. It's a big fat lie, especially here on Facebook and YouTube, because people only show you what they want you to see. So, um, the whole idea that anyone has all their stuff together is unlikely. So the reason I say this is not to pull the sheet away or the covers from all the people who, you know, you admire for having everything, um, but The reality of it is, is when you think you've screwed up and everything sucks, the reality of it is, is you're just living life like everyone else. And as bad as it is, you're still here contemplating how good or bad it is. So it can't be that bad because you're still 6 feet above ground, not 6 feet under. So stress, that is what life is about. How do you deal with it? How do you make it less overwhelming? All of that. So I think tonight's theme should really be eating an elephant. So for those of you who never heard it, the eating of an elephant, how do you do it? It was a riddle or something that I learned as a kid. Hey Peter. Um, so eating an elephant, how do you eat an elephant? And the answer is one bite at a time. So when you are dealing with anything, it's the same thing. When stuff is overwhelming, too much, and frustrating, and scary, and all of those things, just break it down into smaller pieces. I know that that is easier said than done. There are things that I would love to be so much better at than I am, and I am just not. And be like, oh, you've got all your stuff together. I'm like, not so much. I really wish that I did. So, uh, that's kind of it. Eat an elephant one bite at a time. And believe it or not, that could be the suicide prevention talk for today, because that's sort of the key. It always could be worse, it always could be better. And the thing that can help keep you going is that tomorrow could be a little bit better, and tomorrow could be a little worse though too. However, I think we talked about this before, is that when you break something, like bones for example. If I break my fingers, uh, karate dudes will know this, um, the ones who punch cement, right? You see the guys do the karate chop, go through cement. The way they've done that is they've created— they've whacked the side of their hands so many times they have multiple, multiple micro fractures, and the broken parts grow back stronger.. So they like literally have steel hands because they've broken it so many times that the rebuilding is what makes them stronger. And unfortunately, in today's society, we seem to have this idea is that you don't— you want to go through life unscathed without anything bad happening to you. And yet, if you talk about or think about for a moment The most amazing stories you hear are what? They're the stories where someone has come out of amazing and horrible tragedy and yet made it work for them anyway. So wherever you're at, understand there is someone out there that's got it worse than you. No matter where you're at, there's somewhere that's got someone out there who's got it better than you. But like we tell our kids, none of that matters. What matters is you. In what you focus on. So if you're gonna have a great day, have a great day. Um, you get to decide. And no, it's not that easy, trust me. I've dealt with depression, anxiety, all that fun stuff. Social anxiety is the best. Everyone's like, not you, Brooke, you know. I'm like, yeah, no, social sucks. So there you have it. I got nothing much for this evening. I thought I had more stuff together, but I'm confused by the two cameras. It's very distracting. So thanks for checking in. Uh, I know a lot of you guys are sharing this and, um, letting me know that it is helping, and some people it helps and other people it gives hope to and all of that. And I am always looking for feedback. However, if you have anything you want me to cover, that sort of thing, QPR training is something that you can look into. My understanding is it's super short, so super quick. QPR, question something, respond. QPR, if I had to guess, would be question, pause, respond, because one of the challenges we do is we talk without getting a response from people. But understand and know the signs of suicide. They're not always obvious. There's plenty of people that are suicidal that you'll never know. And if you are suicidal, one of the things that we have available now that we didn't have when I was a teen is there's hotlines. Call 211. There's the suicide hotline. You can text someone and get a counselor right now if you need it. Um, just Google it because you're on Facebook or YouTube and, uh, you can Google suicide prevention, thing pops up will be the National Suicide Hotline. So, and then the other part of it that I always forget about is when you're survived. And I think folks who are suicidal are unlikely to think of the people they leave behind, because I know when I was planning my own demise, my thought process was everyone was going to be better off without me. So just so you have an idea— hey Sheena, um, I owe you something. Oh, I owe you an email. So, um, so yeah, so when they are left behind and people are always asking at funerals, like, what were they thinking? What were they thinking? They've got a kid, they've got a wife, they've got a husband, that sort of stuff. And unfortunately, my personal experience— I can't talk for anyone else because you don't get to ask them after the fact— but, um, I know my thought was that I was making life easier for everyone else when I decided that that it would be better if I wasn't here versus if I was here. So, um, not that that necessarily helps anyone who's leaving, but, um, that is kind of it. All right, as usual, I know I stay under 15 minutes, and today it's even going to be under 10. So what are my lessons for today in less than 10 minutes? 1: Eat an elephant one bite at a time. 2, nobody has their crap together. Some people look like they have their stuff together, and all of us have our stuff together once in a while, and we can make it look like we're doing really well, but everybody has struggles, and you're never gonna know anybody else's struggles. So give yourself grace, because I think where we get in trouble comparing ourselves to others is that we're like, how can this person do all of these things and we can't? It's like, you don't know what else is going on with them. So what else? Uh, if you're in trouble, suicide hotline, super easy. Google it. In Connecticut, call 211. They can hook you up with a counselor right away. And the power of 3— just do 3 things. Every morning I've gotten in the habit of waking up and setting my intention for the day. And at night I say my bedtime prayers and say gratitude for everything that's happened in my life, good or bad, because like I said, just like the breaking of your hand, things that break you and harm you, when you heal from them, you are stronger than you were before. So, and I know some of us wish we were not as strong as we are, so there is that, and I get that one too. So that is it. I'm gonna be out of here in less than 10 minutes today. Oh no, I lied. Now I'm at 10 minutes and 8 seconds. So Good night, see you next week, and have a great week. And I'll talk to y'all. Oh, questions, by all means, please send me questions. And thanks for watching. Bye. Yes, I do.
