Tool For Tuesday: Terrorists Want You Dead. Celebrate Being Alive.

My husband Jonny and I dedicated our run this morning to all the victims of the Boston Marathon attack on April 15.

If you’re a runner, run your miles in memory of all those who were killed and all those wounded senselessly and all those who were there and are suffering.

As I have learned in Israel, the best way to fight terrorists—who celebrate death and destruction—is to honor life. Don’t give in to fear. Don’t stop doing what you normally do. Don’t give up and hide because that means that the terrorists have won.

Don’t let them win. Be deliberate. It’s a mind-game. They want to control you. They want to restrict you. They want to slash your freedom. Do not be fooled by the rhetoric of revolution. They don’t want to discuss anything with you; they want you dead.

It’s rather gruesome tool for Tuesday but it’s vital that you get the message across. Be tough. Stand up for yourself. Stand together with people who believe differently than you to show that mutual respect and agreeing to disagree is possible.

Live this day with awareness of your freedom, your ability to believe what you want and say what you want.

Tool For Tuesday: Do whatever you were supposed to do today wholeheartedly and consciously and deliberately. Celebrate life.

Boston Marathon Bombing: Keep Calm and Carry On – Bruce Schneier (theatlantic.com)
3 Dead in Boston Marathon Bombing Seen by White House as Terrorism (foxnews.com)
Investigators hunt for clues in Boston Marathon bombing – Reuters (reuters.com)
Boston Marathon Explosions the Work of Amateur Terrorists, Says Expert (theepochtimes.com)
http://www.timesofisrael.com/burger-joint-to-open-in-memory-of-terror-victim/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAA8XbRjpVo

About dianabletter

Diana Bletter is the author of several books, including The Invisible Thread: A Portrait of Jewish American Women (with photographs by Lori Grinker), shortlisted for a National Jewish Book Award. Her novel, A Remarkable Kindness, (HarperCollins) was published in 2015. She is the First Prize Winner of Moment Magazine's 2019 Fiction Contest. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Commentary, tabletmag, Glamour, The Forward, The North American Review, Times of Israel, and is a reporter for Israel21C, and many other publications. She is author of Big Up Yourself: It's About Time You Like Being You and The Mom Who Took off On Her Motorcycle, a memoir of her 10,000-mile motorcycle trip to Alaska and back to New York. She lives in a small beach village in Western Galilee, Israel, with her husband and family. She is a member of the local hevra kadisha, the burial circle, and a Muslim-Jewish-Christian-Druze women's group in the nearby town of Akko. And, she likes snowboarding and climbing trees.

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3 Responses to Tool For Tuesday: Terrorists Want You Dead. Celebrate Being Alive.

Turnip Times says:

April 16, 2013 at 8:04 am

Great idea

Tracy Campbell says:

April 16, 2013 at 8:05 pm

Diana, thank you for putting a positive spin on this horrible act of cowardness. 🙂

Marylin Warner says:

April 16, 2013 at 9:02 pm

The best way to defeat and deflate terrorists is to honor and celebrate life. I added two words to yours after hearing a 4th grade girl who breathlessly finished track practice today, took a piece a chalk and printed in big letters across the practice finish line: They didn’t win.
We need to remember this and hold tight.