Katniss didn’t want to be a hero. She wanted a quiet life away from everyone. She didn’t want any part of the rebellion, but she realized she had been created for a vital role whether she wanted it or not. She realizes that the world is bigger than her loved ones and she does the best that she can to fulfill that role and of course, because she isn’t perfect, not everything falls the way she wants it to. To me, it was very realistic and I’m able to understand it and appreciate it. I didn’t think that a movie would be made from the books because of the brutality of the third book, but I guess people want to see it fall through.

Honestly, when I reread the third book and watched Catching Fire, the movie really moved me and when I watched Hunger Games I actually cried. I didn’t when I watched it the first time, but when I read the books, I’m reminded of the person that they’re supposed to be. You are introduced to a very realistic and different thought process of a regular, imperfect person.

Honestly, I didn’t really like the movies, because alone you miss so much. With the books, the movies paint some sort of picture, but I’m still running the other scenes in my head. They just have faces now. There is so much character development in the books and that’s why, for me the final is acceptable and actually fitting. It’s not what you expect or even wants, but its the only way the series can end and I still really like the series. It just hurts my heart when I finish that book.

So really to do justice to my life narrative, I need to see the past 26 years as the first 16 years of “KOPH building” and the past 10 years (since 2003) as my recovery. For 10 years I’ve been recovering from those first 16 years in Toledo ubf as well as my own personal trauma recovery.

I believe I’m reaching “stage 4” now…

Stage One: Circuit-breaking
“If you overload an electrical system with too much energy and too much stimulation, the circuit breaker activates and shuts everything down. The human nervous system is also an electrical system, and when it is overloaded with too much stimulation and too much danger, as in trauma, it also shuts down to just basics. People describe it as feeling numb, in shock or dead inside.”

“When the system starts to recover and can handle a bit more stimulation and energy—and the human system is destined to try to recover, to seek equilibrium—feelings begin to return.”

Stage Two: Return of Feelings

“Most people have not experienced so much primary trauma that they must see a professional counselor; they can work through their feelings by involving the people they are close to. They do it by telling their story—a hundred times. They need to talk talk talk, recount the gory details. That is the means by which they begin to dispel the feelings of distress attached to their memories.

The more that feelings can be encouraged, the better. The more you feel the more you heal.

The expression of feelings can take many forms. For most people it may be easiest to talk. But others may need to write. Or draw. However they tell their stories, the rest of us have an obligation to listen.”

“Emotions come in tidal waves that are so big, comprehensive and overwhelming that those who get them feel like they’re going to drown. They flail about, and then the wave recedes; they discover that they’re still alive and they feel better. Tsunamis usually occur because people repress their feelings of pain.”

Stage Three: Constructive Action
“Stage Two and Stage Three go hand in hand. To go forward you feel and you act. You can’t do one or the other. Acting and feeling become an engine that propels you forward.”

Stage Four: Reintegration
“Traumatic experiences are broken bones of the soul. If you engage in the process of recovery, you get stronger. If you don’t, the bones remain porous, with permanent holes inside, and you are considerably weaker.

In this stage of recovery, you reintegrate your self and your values in a new way. You incorporate meaning in your life. You integrate deeper and more authentic ways of communicating.

People at this stage may experience a new sense of the preciousness of life, a clarification of goals and renewed commitment to them, and new understanding of the value of ties to others. But to get to stage four you have to go through the first three stages.”

Yet no one can open anyone else’s eyes but God. So if we are upset that some UBF leaders continue to “take the high road” by their deafening silence (or “lack of repentance”), then we might be indirectly blaming God for not opening their eyes and repenting, as we might expect them to.

I love it! What does [God] say?

Yes I LOVE the Hunger Games, and can’t wait to see the second movie. And yes I haven’t quite recovered from ubf enough to prevent me from overlaying such movies into the ubf situation. So when Katniss (in the first movie) shoots the arrow at the affluent spectators watching her training, I imagined doing just that at a ubf meeting!

Maybe someday I won’t overlay movies with my ubf experience, portraying myself as the unsung hero that overthrows the oppressors…but that day has not come yet.

When I did a personal study on the book of Job, I found justice as a key theme (of course I suppose I was looking for such a theme :)

So I love the ending, with God’s litany of questions, and yes I have often envisioned standing up in a ubf senior staff meeting and saying these words:

7 “Brace yourself like a man;
I will question you,
and you shall answer me.
8 “Would you discredit my justice?
Would you condemn me to justify yourself?
9 Do you have an arm like God’s,
and can your voice thunder like his?

Job 40:7-9

And as you might guess one of my favorite bible passages became Isaiah 28:16-18.

16 So this is what the Sovereign Lord says:

“See, I lay a stone in Zion, a tested stone,
a precious cornerstone for a sure foundation;
the one who relies on it
will never be stricken with panic.
17 I will make justice the measuring line
and righteousness the plumb line;
hail will sweep away your refuge, the lie,
and water will overflow your hiding place.
18 Your covenant with death will be annulled;
your agreement with the realm of the dead will not stand.
When the overwhelming scourge sweeps by,
you will be beaten down by it.