Life in High Definition

Life in High Definition
Photo by Normand Duval

Sunday 17 August 2014

Depression, and Suicide

I too have been thinking a lot about depression and suicide as it seems to be on everyone's mind with Robin Williams leaving us as he did. I wish I could tell the world that thinking about suicide , living through depression and anxiety are more common than anyone thinks and that it doesn't only happen to people that had a rough childhood or terrible things happened to them; it happens to everyone and sometimes out of the blue with no reason even when everything seems to be just right. Everyone at some point in their lives if they are living semi conscious...questions and doubt their existence and what it's all about. It's normal! Why do we make it seem like some abnormal ill only some people are or should be subjected to? It's not a disease...or even if it is an illness like all illnesses for me it's a passage of something that needs to come out...some part of the soul that needs to say "what the fuck is all this for anyway?" And in desperate times:  "I don't want to be here anymore, I hate this game of life! it's pointless!!" I've had a few desperate moments in my life where I seriously wanted to end my life as the pain I felt in that moment was overwhelming and the only way out seem to leave my body. My first time was around 14-15 yrs old although I have no recollection as to why. I just remember wanting out of life and the thought of my family and the guilt of leaving them waking me from that desperate trance where I felt fearless and desirous of death. 

Along the way and maybe only recently I really got that I feel and am open to my pain so when it surfaces due to some life event or trigger that touches that part of me I choose to listen and be with it in its entirety and it's never pretty nor easy but I know "that too shall pass". I am not religious in any way but those words I have repeated to myself many times; and they've saved my life. I think most of us fear getting stuck in the pit of hell when we visit it or it visits us unexpectedly. We fear it will take over our lives and maybe it does for awhile and for some they may stay stuck for years and some even a lifetime. Maybe I'm naive and ignorant due to my having the ability to bounce back from very low lows and dark days, that I believe seeing it as a normal passage of life, like a natural ebb and flow moving through us to help us awaken. Maybe knowing some greats and some not so well known people who have been there and come out of these times more awake, more aware and thirstier for life than ever helped me see it as a healthy rite of passage. Something like a Native American Vision Quest going out into the wilderness facing and visiting the demons we fear in order to grow up. It took me long to accept this part of my human nature however it's no longer wrong nor a failure for me but a part of life so I can let myself sink low knowing I will again float back up when I am done, freer than ever of the demons I faced. I believe if we allow ourselves these moments without making them or us wrong even if the feeling feels horribly bad and wrong, trusting ourselves to be able to survive them; then they pass and we move on especially if we are open to the fact that there is a benifit. I may be wrong and maybe simplistic in thinking when we believe there is something 
seriously wrong for having those thoughts and feelings and that it's abnormal then it makes it all that much more unbearable and necessary to avoid, ignore, take drugs, alcohol, be hospitalized or simply bail out.  None of which are wrong in my perception, they simply are tools of survival. It's up to us to decide whether they help or not. We are all built differently and survive differently. 

Finally I do not see suicide as a crime nor a horrible failure on the part of the person leaving nor of 
those around them, I see it simply as a way out of pain, and one of the many ways in which we leave 
this world. I wonder if when we all die it isn't the soul simply saying "ok I've had enough I'm outa here!!" by which ever means there is. Although I'm pretty sure our time is previously determined by ourselves before we even embark on our human journey which often has an unhappy ending for all those left behind, and always is, in my perception, a very freeing experience for the person passing.