You Are Not in Control

(Trigger warning: the following text features a frank discussion about mental illness, self harm and suicide.)

It has been months since the news out of Madison, Wisc. reporting yet another school shooting (it was the 323rd shooting of 2024). It resets (albeit, briefly) the prevailing conversation about firearms access and mental health.

Police identified the suspect as 15-year-old Natalie Rupnow, who shot eight people on campus at Abundant Life Christian School. Two victims perished while six survived with wounds that ranged from moderate to live-threatening.

First responders arriving at the scene found Rupnow wounded from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot. She died in transport to a nearby hospital.

Social media were quick to report that Rupnow left behind a six-page missive elaborating on her thoughts. The authenticity of the document has not yet been established, however, details in the pages reveal an individual afflicted by rage and alienation .

Titled “War Against Humanity,” the text addresses hatred and the writer’s sense of worthlessness. The essay deploys a train of thought that is often challenging to follow, peppered with leaps of logic and non sequitors. If form has a function, then it reveals to us the troubled state of mind of the writer.

What the overall document conveys, in my view, is a vulnerable person who desperately wanted to regain some sense of agency or self assertion in her life. She even went so far as to change the name she was given at birth to a name, I presume, of her choosing. Ending her own life gave Natalie Rupnow a moment of self-determined agency.

How one actualizes self agency is by exerting a mastery over how we respond to life’s tumult and trials. Learning to react to adversity in a way that avoids betrayal of our own dignity or self-worth. Yes, far easier said or written than actually achievable.

The discourses of marketing and commerce cram our attention spans with incessant messages about individual autonomy or self-actualization—what’re relevant only to those fortunate enough to transact the means toward autonomy or actualization. Within a private enterprise system that selects only a few ascenders out of a far greater multitude — it is a blunt cruelty for the messaging machine to incessantly assert otherwise.

Nevertheless, Elon Musk’s automobiles and rockets still remain vulnerable to malfunction.

In my private life, over the last several years, I have committed considerable effort to set up a small business helping to match investors with start-ups. It’s not an inventive business model and there are probably countless numbers of those who have attempted and succeeded at the effort. After a handful of seasons of sustained labors and inevitable failures, I walked away from it.

I admitted to myself that had I succeeded, I would have given up writing in a heartbeat. These words I weave are my act of self-determination.

Suicide is a last desperate act of self-determination for a soul who has not — cannot — accept that as individuals, we are not in control. For me, I have had to endure a crucible of experiences to accept that lesson. I suspect that self-mastery arrives when we blunt the hard knocks life deals us with the defiance of surviving.

(If you are experiencing an emotional crisis or thoughts of suicide, call or text 988 or chat 988lifeline.org for free, 24/7, confidential services.)