She lived in a house where her parents were always cursing, yelling, and fussing.
Daddy didn’t know how to control his anger so he and mama started tussling.
She saw her mother sitting in the corner shielding her face and crying to herself.
She walked in the room and offered her mother some help.
Her mom refused and said, “I’m strong enough to get up on my own.”
Her daddy stepped in and told her to leave her mother alone.
She left and he closed the door.
She listened in on the conversation to know what he’s saying and why he’s saying it for.
Her daddy started by saying, “Woman you just don’t know what you put me through.
These arguments, these accusations and on top of that, I have work to do!
I know my anger gets out of control sometimes,
But you have to believe me when I say I’m sorry because I’m not lying.
The only reason I do these things is because I love you.
I’m willing to change for you.”

The girl thought to herself,
But when does that start?
Tomorrow, later, or today?
His now became a later,
today became a tomorrow, and tomorrow ended up being his yesterday.
Then she realized her father’s talk of suggested change wasn’t going to happen any day.

The environment she lived in wasn’t any better.
She lived in a place where graffiti was on every building,
People hung out on street corners “chilling”,
Most people’s goals never went as high as the sky but only to the ceiling,
A place where talking led to arguing,
Arguing led to fighting,
And fighting led to killing.
She lived in a place where mothers cared more about their nails and hair
Than buying their children some socks and underwear.
A place where fathers disclaimed their own child
And ran around on the streets acting wild.

Every day she heard about the young kids who were killed
And the Christian reformers of the neighborhood talked about how the people had the will…
the will to change.
People gathered to listen and actually thought about what they were saying
Less than twenty four hours later,
everyone was back to doing the same things they did
and the speeches of suggested change throughout the neighborhood continued.

She lived in a society of judgment.
She was judged for her skin tone,
the clothes she wore,
the things she liked and
the things she didn’t like.
She lived in a society where she was bullied
for being “different”,
for having different opinions,
and for not being in the “in crowd”.
She lived in a society where
being different led to being judged,
being judged led to being bullied,
and being bullied led to harming one’s self to escape the pain.

Authoritative figures recognized the problem.
They brought up the question: “When are we going to change?”
Throughout the nation they held assemblies to stop bullying and prevent gangs.
People listened and some even felt moved to do something about it
but as the year progressed, bullying became an even bigger problem in the nation.

When are we going to change?
No, the real question is when are we going to see?
We need to see that talking about change isn’t as affective as doing it.
The blind can’t lead the blind
Even the Bible says that from Luke 6:39
And if you haven’t got one thing from me today, get this:
Don’t talk about the change, be about the change.
One by one we can all make a difference so our hard lives won’t continue to be the same.