I once talked an individual I was very close to out of committing suicide. He had experienced a number of rather terrible situations, with severe psychological and physical issues, that were causing him a great deal of pain. He was utterly hopeless, and firmly reiterated to me several times that there was no way to fix his life.
After getting him to calm down a little bit, I had him talk to me about what his problems were. I asked him why he thought it wouldn’t ever get better. We talked for a while, and I realized that there was a solution that had just honestly never occurred to him. It would take several painful months before his life started improving, but there was a third alternative that would almost certainly improve his life drastically. He decided not to kill himself, seeing that this other choice, although it would be painful and difficult, was significantly better than suicide.
Now, in this case, he had mentally searched for a third alternative for months, ever since he first started contemplating suicide, and I genuinely think he would have accepted one if he had found it. He was just not able to find the way out. Chris argued in his post that it is possible for someone to rationally determine that death is the best option. I do agree that it’s at least possible. My probability estimate for any one person being able to do that, though, is extremely low. Pain and sorrow dull and slow your mind. I know, I’ve got a history of depression, etc, and your ability to think drops dramatically when you are suffering from those emotions. If you are hurting enough that you are considering suicide, then you should consider that the pain is probably bad enough that you are not thinking as clearly as someone who was detached from the problem would be. So talk to someone. Find as many truly intelligent people as you can and get them to try to find a way out of your dilemma. Hell, if you don’t know anyone, get in touch with me, and I’d be happy to see if I can spot anything you’re missing.
Suicide is an irreversible step (unless you get yourself frozen, which I generally endorse). You don’t want to do that if you’re missing something obvious. Is it possible that you will decide to kill yourself for all the right reasons, and that there genuinely is no better option? Possible, but fairly unlikely. Recognize that you are very emotionally involved at the moment, which probably isn’t doing wonders for your level of rationality. I recommend you get someone to check your work.
Just to point out that I agree with this (now quite old) comment.
Took me four years to understand why I was depressed and couldn’t see a way out of it ; and now I can, and I’m no longer depressed! Focusing on the virtue of empiricism is definitely good for that, especially as that’s the main thing a depressed and suicidal person won’t do. But perhaps it’s something you can only do well after having done some work on the virtue of finding a good therapist to start dealing with the depression, though :-) At least that’s how it worked for me.
I once talked an individual I was very close to out of committing suicide. He had experienced a number of rather terrible situations, with severe psychological and physical issues, that were causing him a great deal of pain. He was utterly hopeless, and firmly reiterated to me several times that there was no way to fix his life.
After getting him to calm down a little bit, I had him talk to me about what his problems were. I asked him why he thought it wouldn’t ever get better. We talked for a while, and I realized that there was a solution that had just honestly never occurred to him. It would take several painful months before his life started improving, but there was a third alternative that would almost certainly improve his life drastically. He decided not to kill himself, seeing that this other choice, although it would be painful and difficult, was significantly better than suicide.
Now, in this case, he had mentally searched for a third alternative for months, ever since he first started contemplating suicide, and I genuinely think he would have accepted one if he had found it. He was just not able to find the way out. Chris argued in his post that it is possible for someone to rationally determine that death is the best option. I do agree that it’s at least possible. My probability estimate for any one person being able to do that, though, is extremely low. Pain and sorrow dull and slow your mind. I know, I’ve got a history of depression, etc, and your ability to think drops dramatically when you are suffering from those emotions. If you are hurting enough that you are considering suicide, then you should consider that the pain is probably bad enough that you are not thinking as clearly as someone who was detached from the problem would be. So talk to someone. Find as many truly intelligent people as you can and get them to try to find a way out of your dilemma. Hell, if you don’t know anyone, get in touch with me, and I’d be happy to see if I can spot anything you’re missing.
Suicide is an irreversible step (unless you get yourself frozen, which I generally endorse). You don’t want to do that if you’re missing something obvious. Is it possible that you will decide to kill yourself for all the right reasons, and that there genuinely is no better option? Possible, but fairly unlikely. Recognize that you are very emotionally involved at the moment, which probably isn’t doing wonders for your level of rationality. I recommend you get someone to check your work.
Just to point out that I agree with this (now quite old) comment.
Took me four years to understand why I was depressed and couldn’t see a way out of it ; and now I can, and I’m no longer depressed! Focusing on the virtue of empiricism is definitely good for that, especially as that’s the main thing a depressed and suicidal person won’t do. But perhaps it’s something you can only do well after having done some work on the virtue of finding a good therapist to start dealing with the depression, though :-) At least that’s how it worked for me.