Listening is hard.

Let's face it.

There are so many distractions around us that it makes it hard to pay attention to those around us and what's going on.

As the news broke that there was yet another school shooting that happened at Santa Fe High School, mere months after the shooting at Parkland, it's time that we look up and listen to the children that make up our society.

As someone who works with them, admittedly it is difficult to listen to them when they talk about serious things, like relationships, school, and even politics. We have a tendency to write them off as too young to have an opinion, or that they're too young to think about those things. Listening is more than just listening to respond. It is putting everything down, looking the person you're talking to in the eyes, giving them your whole focus, hearing what they're saying, thinking about it, and then responding. I feel that we don't give our children that.

Because we know how to listen, at least in a general response kind of way, then why can we not apply it to our next generation? They are the people following, the leaders of tomorrow, but yet we don't offer them the same level of respect that we expect from them. I find it funny how we hold them to such high standards regarding education, social life, and professional life for those old enough to hold down a job. Because of this and the wonderful opportunities some of them have, children have the simply brilliant minds like we've never seen before. They're creative and intelligent and resourceful. We've raised them to come up behind us, to be better than we are, but we don't seem to value them.

Look at the students from Parkland. Ever since the shooting, they have been speaking on and begging for gun reform. The students from Santa Fe have been doing the same, yet no changes have really been made. Their voices, while being heard, are being brushed aside or ignored. I find this so heartbreaking because, those of us who are college students now will be leaders along with them in a few years, and I fear that it will take until then for the changes we need to see to take place.

So why are they not being listened to?

Broadly, I think that it could be because people want to be protected from their truths. It's a risk to take on a different viewpoint. The older generations are afraid to risk hearing opinions that are different than theirs, to open up to truths that they weren't taught to look for. We seem to be so set in our ways that we refuse to change. Restructuring a state of mind is something that is painful, unpleasant, and is very difficult process, and we won't do it for anyone. It's almost as if we are protecting ourselves from anything that forces us to change or open our minds.This is something that needs to change, because the children watching us learn this coping mechanism and do it themselves, adopting the refusal and negativity.

We, as those who are somewhat older, need to break through the conditioning of nonchalance towards them. We have to break through the hesitation of heading the command to listen and simply just...listen We can set the example of acceptance and show how simply listening and working together can make great changes in our communities. And I think that, if we can do that, we will be all the better for it.