Children are everyone's business. Psychologist Deborah Rozman, executive vice president of HeartMath, a training and consulting organization that focuses on emotional mastery, is working on solutions. Rozman's group has been hard at work convincing school authorities that today's children are sorely lacking in life skills, including how to control and deal with their emotions. Early intervention is the key. After a crisis like Santana, we all feel a wide assortment of painful and confusing emotions.
Fear leads to anger and anger is the result of feeling powerless.
According to Rozman, powerful emotions are carried in our memory and can affect us for years or even a lifetime. Dwelling on negative emotions too long can cause emotional scarring that makes it difficult to let go of the pain and anger. Letting go of anger is critical to emotional survival. Powerful emotions have a way of sticking in our subconscious, springing forward whenever a memory trigger is activated. HeartMath experts say crisis experiences like Santana have made us pay more attention to the emotional and mental health of our children, but not enough.