With the recent movies I’ve seen over the last year or so, the everpresent theme is becoming all too clear for me and should be for anyone else:

“Let go of Generational Trauma. Destroy it if you can!”

For those not in the know, or with a good family in your arsenal, Generational Trauma is what you get when the negative family patterns of the matriarch or patriarch follow with each elder generation. Some don’t really realize it like how you’d explain to your children that they can’t be trusted because THEY themselves weren’t trusted because THEIR parents weren’t trusted and so on and so forth while some do realize it like telling your child they can’t be gay or date outside their race because “it’s not right” or “doesn’t fit the family tradition”. It sucks and is a lot more common than you think, but we can progress out of it. Let’s view some media that’s trying to get you out of the jam.

One film that’s been prevalent in fixing what continues to ail us is the movie Encanto. If you’re watching just to be kept up on Lin-Manuel Miranda’s musical exploits (We’ll discuss the rapping slave master musical later), then you missed out on a real message. A lot of people felt more like Mirabel in that she didn’t have a gift that the grandmother would accept, but in actuality, the lot of you are Bruno in this case. Bruno’s gift was seen as a curse where he would break the focus of many people by “telling the future” where in reality, he would tell reality versus the tales they were told about themselves. Seek to never be like the grandmother.

Another? Watch Everything Everywhere At Once. A movie solely about breaking the traditional binds that families have due to the abhorrent levels of Generational Trauma. I can’t spoil the movie since it is actually very good, but I will say that you gotta at least explain the shortcomings to your children and that you love them regardless. It goes the extra mile more than you realize.

I just want a generation of kids who aren’t weighed down by transgressions started by people born without hope. We can do so much better and generally get more advanced in our society further if we planted the correct mental seeds in them. I seriously want therapy to become destitute going further and mental health cases to diminish because we would be better off with a more positive support role in our families.

Be cool to your peoples and everyone around you.