Suicide Is Painful... In More Ways

 

What if you commit suicide... and end up right where you started? Would you live life differently? But, how would you know? 

Life is about making choices.  It is about learning.  And, most of all, it is all about living. Suicide is counter to why we are here, and this is why you end up right back where you started.  You can't cheat the "Big Guy" out of the lessons He has planned for you.  If you keep offing yourself, sooner or later you're going to have to make the decision to not, and learn the lessons you are supposed to learn.

Everybody I meet or know wonders when they will be constantly happy.  I tell them, it is a simple choice you make for your life. From the time you are little, your parents should have told you to strive for true happiness always and in all things, regardless of your circumstances.  Why didn't they?  Because no one ever told them, that's why. If you get nothing, you can teach nothing, unless you think for yourself. 

With most of the people I meet, good luck with that.  I'll be generous. Most people have a 50/50 shot at Glory Hallelujah. They will be miserable most of their life.  Oh, they'll tell you they are happy, and I'll give them that, but are they truly happy? Remember?  You were supposed to strive for true happiness always and in all things, regardless of your circumstances. 

A good number of the people asking questions, on the site I frequent, are looking to end their perceived pain. That pain that they brought onto themselves, but blame other people for. Like other people can tell them how to live their lives, right? A few have an epiphany: "You mean, I didn't have to do that?" No, dumbass, you didn't.  It is your life, not theirs.

The greater number of people, wallowing in their personal pit of misery, when you ask them why, they are in denial that they could ever do anything wrong. So... why are they in a pit of misery?  They must have done something terribly wrong. And, this is where I usually get blasted by the members of the League of the Perpetually Offended. God only knows they wouldn't put themselves in the pit.  Oh, hell no! Call me kinda silly, but, I keep wondering why the perpetually offended would let someone else put them there?  I suppose so they could continue to be perpetually offended.

Well, I've just about run this to ground. Suicide is not good for anyone.  It is certainly not good for people considering suicide.  It is almost always painful, according to the experts, because most people screw it up. Yep.  They can't even kill themselves right.  So, don't do it. Get some help.  Better yet, understand that you are in charge of you. Strive to be truly happy always and in all things, regardless of your circumstances. If it doesn't kill you, and if you don't kill yourself due to it, it will make you so much stronger when you come out the other side.  

This I know, for a fact

“The so-called ‘psychotically depressed’ person who tries to kill herself doesn’t do so out of quote ‘hopelessness’ or any abstract conviction that life’s assets and debits do not square. And surely not because death seems suddenly appealing. The person in whom Its invisible agony reaches a certain unendurable level will kill herself the same way a trapped person will eventually jump from the window of a burning high-rise. Make no mistake about people who leap from burning windows. Their terror of falling from a great height is still just as great as it would be for you or me standing speculatively at the same window just checking out the view; i.e. the fear of falling remains a constant. The variable here is the other terror, the fire’s flames: when the flames get close enough, falling to death becomes the slightly less terrible of two terrors. It’s not desiring the fall; it’s terror of the flames. And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling ‘Don’t!’ and ‘Hang on!’, can understand the jump. Not really. You’d have to have personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way beyond falling.”

-- David Foster Wallace

“But, in the end, one needs more courage to live than to kill himself.”

-- Albert Camus

“There comes a time when you look into the mirror and you realize that what you see is all that you will ever be. And then you accept it. Or you kill yourself. Or you stop looking in mirrors.”

-- J. Michael Straczynski

Editor's Note

(Re: disclaimer cum "get out of jail free" card)

Before you go getting your panties in a bunch - it is essential to understand that this is just an opinion site and, as such, can be subjected to scrutiny by anyone with a differing opinion. It doesn't make either view any more right or wrong than the other. Opinion, presented in this context, is a way of inciting others to think and, hopefully, to form their own opinions, if they haven't already done so. This is also why, occasionally, I will present an "opinion" just to stir an emotional pot. Where it may sound like I agree with the statements made, I'm more interested in getting others to consider an alternate viewpoint.

I fervently hope that we keep open and active minds when reading opinions while engaging in peaceful and constructive discussion in an arena of mutual respect concerning those opinions offered. After twenty-three years of military intelligence, I believe that engaging each other in this manner, and in this arena, is a way we will learn tolerance and respect for differing beliefs, cultures, and viewpoints.

We all fall from grace, some more often than others; it is part of being human. God's test for us is what we learn from the experience... and what we do afterward.

Pastor Tony spent 22 years with United States Air Force Intelligence as a planner, analyst, briefer, instructor, and senior manager. Following his service career, he spent 17 years working with the premier and world-renowned Western Institutional Review Board, helping to protect the rights of human subjects involved in pharmaceutical research. He also served 8 years on the Board of Directors for the Angela J. Bowen Foundation.

Ordained in 2013 as an "interfaith" minister, he founded the Congregation for Religious Tolerance in response to intolerance shown by Christians toward peaceful Islam. As a weapon for his war on intolerance, he chose the pen. He wages his "battle" in the guise of the Congregation's official online blog, The Path, of which he is both author and editor. "The Path" offers a vehicle for commentary and guidance concerning one's personal, spiritual path toward peace and the final destination for us all. He resides in Pass Christian, Mississippi, where he volunteered as the lead chaplain at a regional medical center.

Feel free to contact Pastor Tony at: tolerantpastor@gmail.com