Shoulda, coulda, woulda? Is the desire to die...natural?
If someone is standing on a ledge..do you talk them down? Or let them jump?
How does someone find the inspiration to continue or not?
2007-12-25 14:58:28 · 25 answers · asked by ? 6 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
What if it's yourself?
2007-12-25 15:09:33 · update #1
WillRogerswannabe: I have heard tell of an elixir called 'the Joy of Life'...
2007-12-25 16:17:57 · update #2
It was me once. I wanted to die, I did not like it here & just wanted to leave. I think I never hurt so bad in my life as when I gave up suicide as an option, then I felt I had no hope or out. I won't lie & say that occasionally I don't go back there, but usually it is as CC says, I am at a crossroads. This also can happen a lot to empaths, we just get overwhelmed at times. I found not inspiration at first, but reasons to continue. I took what I knew & used it as a tool to propel me forward. It was my Dark Night of the Soul. In choosing to stay the course the light at the end of that dark forest was something I only dreamed of becoming, being connected to God, myself, & all.
What would I do to help someone in this place? I would take their hand, I would walk with them as much as they would allow me to, I would be a safe place for them to be what ever is happening now. It is all I can do. But, I would really do this & not just speak the pretty words. The one at the crossroads will find their door in the fullness of time, & I get the honor of being of sevice to them & myself.
Peace & Blessings!
2007-12-26 02:13:16 · answer #1 · answered by Just Be 7 · 9⤊ 1⤋
To directly answer the initial Q, "Not a bad concept, initially.
Certainly it assumes, perhaps that taking control of another is involved.
It also might mean there is a moral dillema raging within the "innoculator", even in possibly crossing or muddying the lines between Medicine and Spirituality?
Death is certainly natural, as should be the acceptance of its inevitibility. What's un-natural is the prolonging of a life that might have reached an "end time"...AND I'm only GOOD not GOD, but as a Mortal, I have no right to suggest that an END should be waited for, or accepted or induced; planned or otherwise.
Someone standing on a ledge:
That assumes the scenario is in fact that the observer knows without question, the "Stander", is there for the purpose of ending their life. In a spiritual sense they may be testing themselves on that ledge? They may be internally exploring what might be the consequences, OR might just be enjoying the sensations that standing on a ledge offer. FREE WILL, is as much a personal individual experience, as it is a "right."
(An abstract, but relative analogy can be found in a not so old Country song, "I was Almost Home.")
Final thought; Inspiration/motivation:
Admittedly the "Toughie". Certainly to be self inspired; self motivated, sounds like the ideal, yet we are constantly driven, or pushed by external influences. Very often those can be overwhelming. An analogy might be "a baseball player, at bat. He's GOOD, and feels fairly certain he can get a HIT, or even a Home Run, until 12 pitchers step onto the mound and fire all at once."
More a "Trick", though not a secret might be to allow positive influences, even minor, to become the heavier balance on ones personal scale of managing their life. I suspect everyone would be OK with positive. I find it to be true that the more GOOD I allow on the scale, the more will follow.
It's a learning or re-learning process for those afflicted with depresion and self doubt, but not impossible. Tuning in to oneself is where it should begin. Getting to know, or re-aquainting with the self, considering the rationale behind quitting, or "staying the course".
My opinion: To attempt to convert another, one might consider the reasons. It could be, in part, a selfish motive? Obviously too, it could be a sense, gained experiencially, then with a desire to "pass on"/ Share with the one who might be perceived as NOT wanting to continue. The problem I see in that however, is that it reverts back to assuming what is best for that other person.
Just my two cents.
Steven Wolf
(The Rev.)
I'm fairly certain I've said more than once, "I wish I was dead." Or "Life Sucks." BUT I also say "Thank you" with every initial breath of every new day. There may come a time, situationally, when I won't say that?
2007-12-25 23:56:40 · answer #2 · answered by DIY Doc 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
If they hear the truth about the right thing and gain understanding it can have a profound effect. The inoculation is a gradual dose of the truth about that which truly binds them.
It can take time to fully recover and yet others find the understanding themselves but no one can be cured unless they want to be.
If they are standing on a ledge where others can see them they want someone to offer a solution else they would not make such a spectacle.
To continue or not, ask "Are you completely aware of where you are going after your life leaves your body for if you are not should you be?" if they don't care then ask "The balance of energy in your life must be equalised just like any system in the universe, have you truly no regrets?
2007-12-26 21:15:58 · answer #3 · answered by James 5 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Hello Sunman.
Woulda, coulda, shoulda ! . . .
Like most things in life it's the inverse where the truth lies. A person truly on the ledge cannot be inoculated with the will to live, he never lost it. He simply aquired a stronger will to not live.
There is an unfortunate difference.
The Best Of The Season To All,
Lenny.
2007-12-25 18:35:25 · answer #4 · answered by Lenny 3 · 5⤊ 0⤋
I'm not sure, not really...you can sustain, maintain, do what is necessary, take care of those in need, but the will to live does not have to be there to do these things.
Medically, there are plenty of drugs out there that can numb, help you forget, dull the pain, but these are not real "cures". They do not really inoculate you or make it "all better". Whether or not you wish to live is still there, somewhere in the murky shadows.
Spiritually, maybe this would be the closest "cure" to not wanting to live. If you can find the light you wish to live by you may be given the will to live. But for those who cannot maintain this light for lengthy periods of time, it is impossible to inoculate. Again, the will to die is there in the murky shadows.
2007-12-30 06:34:22 · answer #5 · answered by Bella Wolffe 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Just love them. Reason will not bring them back... telling them why they should live (eg, friends, family need them, etc) ... this might bring them down off the ledge, but it won't remove the reason for them wishing to return to the Source.
Showing people that they are perfectly lovable, in spite of all their imperfections, is what gives them the will to live. Love feels like God. Sometimes it feels like there is no God in the world, so people want to return to Him prematurely. My Dad did that. I know that he was wrapped in Love as soon as he went to the other side... and had a marvelous realisation. But we, his children and grandchildren, miss him terribly. What can we do without a father?
If my Dad could have known and felt that Love in this life, he might have been healed, like I was. Love heals so many wounds. Love gives us the will to find solutions to health problems that may be overwhelming.
As the person who mentioned NDE said, once we know Love, we neither fear death nor wish for it.
♥ ♥ What a joy it is to know God. For God is Love. ♥ ♥
Before we find that Divine Love within us, there is a path that is sometimes difficult. The struggle to overcome is like a scree on a steep hill... we fall so many times, hurting ourselves. Yet the hope keeps us struggling up the hill, until the clouds are below us and the Light shines on us, warming us with Divine Rays.
So, give the one who has lost the Will to live two things:
Love (just a little taste of what is possible... for abiding LOVE only comes to them after they have overcome their obstacles)
Hope ... let them see the possibilities within themselves. Again, hope comes by loving them... showing them how valuable they really are, through words and actions.
Love is the greatest of all, for it never fails.
2007-12-26 05:56:07 · answer #6 · answered by MumOf5 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
The elixir is called love. It can be given by others, and when it is it often is very effective in inoculating someone with the "will to live" but this only happens temporarily, unless the receiver realizes that the love from without has activated the love that he/she already is.
2007-12-26 01:53:42 · answer #7 · answered by NRPeace 5 · 5⤊ 0⤋
Technically speaking you can medically.
The desire to die is a personal decision not to be made by someone else.
If I saw someone standing on a ledge I would try to talk them down.
Look within oneself spiritual being and seek the meaning of existence through our Father and Holy Spirit.
2007-12-25 17:11:51 · answer #8 · answered by David 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Would trust in one's destiny do it?
That there was / is a 'mission', one came to Earth to fulfill?
Like an Oak tree that must reach it's Greatest Heights?
And outlive the grasses & the shrubs around it.
Grow tall, to touch the sky.
And provide food & shelter for the birds and small animals.
An important, a central figure in the universe.
Free.
A (w)Holy Man.
Most precious thing in the Cosmos.
Noble & Happy.
A Friend to All, whose love is reciprocated, and helps sustain the Universe.
A Gem. A Jewel.
A Diamond. ;-)
(Edit)
La joie de Vivre!
A. R.
2007-12-27 15:04:17 · answer #9 · answered by goodfella 5 · 2⤊ 0⤋
There are strong trends among persons describing Near Death Experiences to say (1) they no longer have any fear of death and (2) they have no inclination to seek death.
They feel they have a greater appreciation, and sometimes a sense of purpose, for life.
Kind of an extreme measure as a literal response to the question posted--namely, having a near death experience "in order to" instill a will to live--but it's offered as a kind of parabolic reply to the heart of the issue.
EDIT: And if it's yourself ...
Actually, I did come very near to dying myself as a child, though I didn't have the full-blown NDE trip. But on the other side of it, when coming back to consciousness, I saw a tremendous beauty ... amidst pain and vomit and mental confusion. And precisely because that unspeakable Beauty was there amidst the pain and "ugliness", I knew that I don't always know. I knew that there is a Miracle going on, and even feelings of anger and despair and violence and depression both (1) are an expression of that Miracle and (2) have a capacity to distract me from it. Part of me Knows better ... though it can be tragically easy to Forget.
To know life like love like what it is to be.
.
2007-12-25 15:11:53 · answer #10 · answered by bodhidave 5 · 4⤊ 0⤋