The Hard Side of Kindness

I've been seeing a lot of pithy, annoying cliche statements about suicide prevention lately. Little notes left on bridges that you're giving the pain to someone else. Little cheery messages about how you should opt to be happy instead of sad. Children with big sad eyes cast upward to let adults know that it will hurt them if you do it.

Guess what? That isn't helping.

There are a lot of reasons why people kill themselves, but I think one of the main ones is that they just feel drained. Emotionally, everyone and everything around them is sucking out their life force already. People keep demanding their attention, demanding their input, demanding they be entertaining, involved, the punching bag, the emotional worker, the physical worker. Those big sad eyes of kids probably do less to keep people alive and more to drive them towards their method of life ending choice.

Look, I know people mean well when they try to keep others from killing themselves. At least, I hope they do. But if that is really your goal, you need new tactics. LISTEN TO THEM. Why are they at the end of their rope? Are they tired, hopeless, drained? Don't just tell them to 'get happy' or to 'think about someone else.' It doesn't work that way.

Ask them what happy feels like to them. Ask them to imagine a moment when they felt pure joy. Ask them to think about what gives them pleasure in a non-sexual way. Is it digging their fingers into dirt? Is it ice cream? Is it a long car ride listening to music?

Happiness isn't a default state and it certainly cannot be a continuous one. Contentment can be continuous, though even that has its downside. However, with contentment comes a sense of being filled and emotionally sated, not drained.

Here's the hard truth though. Sometimes people just can't find a moment of joy to remember. They can't grasp the idea of happiness. With people like this, who have only contention and pain and anger and displeasure and misery and despair in their lives, you need to let them make their own decisions about if they choose to continue to live or not. I mean, some people THRIVE on constant miserable bitching and it's honestly the thing that makes them happy. But for others, perhaps ending the pain is the best thing for them. That isn't giving up on your part. It's being kind.