I was listening to Trace Atkins singing Toby Keith’s song- Ships that Don’t Come In. Here are the lyrics I want to talk about:

So here’s to all the soldiers
Who have ever died in vain
The insane locked up in themselves
And the homeless down on Main

It’s a tribute to soldiers mostly, but that line about the homeless struck me. The homeless is such a difficult subject. I can understand the side that wants to help homeless and provide shelter and food. They want to help their fellow person.

I can also understand the people that don’t want the homeless around where they live. Many are against homeless shelters in our city because to give them things brings more homeless to the area.

The solution to homelessness is way too complicated for the United States to solve.

However, I think we all need to acknowledge that their ship didn’t come in. They may have chosen the exact moment when they became homeless. When they did not make the right choice and chose not to take their meds or chose substances over working, But they did not intend to be homeless.

Life did not go the right way. Mental health or no support in their lives pushed them to the streets.

We think it is all about making the right choices. But instead of their ship coming in, they experienced trauma, mental illness, and loss. We all have subconscious scripts that our brain creates and we don’t know we are reading. Since they are below our consciousness, we don’t see that and we have trouble rewriting them. But to our brain, these scripts make sense. They take, past experiences and say that is how we are going to handle things from now on.

We want homeless people to change. They can. But think of the things you want to change about your life? If we don’t go to those scripts, we don’t change them.

Now imagine if you had no resources like the unhoused people. Wouldn’t it be impossible to make to the dock to catch the ship to healthy living?

I think so. As you watched that ship sail on by, you might decide you like it on the shore?