The pursuit of emotional granularity isn’t always a sunny path of positive self-awareness and actualization. It often requires an acknowledgement of the many manifestations of human suffering.
Feeling suicidal is more than a morbid fascination with death. It is a sincere desire for death. To be genuinely suicidal is not the same as experiencing the emotion of l’appel du vide, in which a person is momentarily tempted to impulsively cause their own demise, but with a simultaneous reaction against that temptation, because the person actually wants to live. When a person is suicidal, a desire for death persists for a long time, and isn’t accompanied by strong internal objections.
There are some people who say that we shouldn’t talk about suicide. They worry that merely hearing about the idea of suicide will make people more likely to kill themselves.
When I hear these concerns, I think about other things that people do when they hear about it. Eating ice cream would be in that category. Often, when someone starts talking about ice cream, I will get the urge to eat ice cream. It sounds like a good idea. Taking a trip to the beach is another thing like this. Whenever a friend goes to the beach and comes back with stories about it, I feel inspired to take a copycat vacation. Conversations that mention ice cream or the beach don’t implant the desire for these things in my mind, but they do remind me of a desire that’s been latent for a while.
The fact that suicide is in this same category suggests that it’s something many people find truly desirable. It’s important to acknowledge that feeling suicidal is an authentic emotional experience. It’s not just a manifestation of mental illness. It’s not just something to cure, and then forget about. It’s culturally taboo and psychologically troubling to even mention feeling suicidal, but it’s a common aspect of being human.
So, let’s talk about feeling suicidal, rather than pretending that it will go away if we pretend it isn’t there.
It’s well known that life is sometimes excruciatingly painful. It’s become popular to advise people who are suffering that things will get better, but the truth is that often, things just keep getting worse.
Death, on the other hand, is a mysterious experience. No one who goes through it is available to talk about it, and the evidence that we do have about death, incomplete though it may be, suggests that it is a condition of complete annihilation of the self.
When a person has come to associate living with intense pain, it becomes difficult to insist that they should continue to hold on to the pain of life, rather than destroying it once and for all. Although our culture objects to suicide, our society doesn’t provide many resources to help people with their pain. Crisis telephone lines aren’t enough. Therapists are expensive, and often lack the skills and resources to provide substantial help. Social connections that might have been of assistance in the past have become thin, as community organizations shut down and people spend less time in person with friends and family. Scrolling through social media streams dominated by emotionally inauthentic influencers isn’t an adequate replacement.
Most people are eager to say that suicide is not the answer, but almost no one is willing to step in to actually help a person feeling suicidal. When a person in suffering asks what the answer is, if it’s not suicide, suddenly there’s silence.
Suicide is a selfish act. When someone kills themselves, they hurt the people who love them and depend on them. The drama of a suicide brings that pain into focus, but the everyday grinding pain suicidal people feel is real too, though it’s often not shared. Many times, we don’t know when people in our lives are feeling suicidal. It’s a hidden shame.
Huge numbers of people aren’t getting the health care, financial help, addiction rehab, career assistance they need. They’re overworked and chronically stressed. They’re sick, they’re tired, and they feel alone. They have good reason to feel hopeless.
The best way to prevent suicide is not with suicide hotlines and counselors. The best way to prevent suicide is create a more compassionate society that helps people in pain before they get to the point of wanting to kill themselves.
Yes, that would be more expensive than setting up a toll-free telephone number, but do we care, or don’t we?
