Killing Yourself Legitimately 

This article is not about euthanasia, though some of you often wish you could just take a pill or wave a magic wand and you would cease to exist. This is about living the life you were truly meant to live.

I arrived on the admission unit of the hospital I was working at, to chaos. The police were waiting outside to admit a patient and inside the ward the duty doctor and staff were wrestling with a young man (Ben), who was determined to mutilate himself. Assessing the situation and emotional temperature quickly I walked into the room where Ben was being restrained by staff I asked him “what I could do to make him feel safe?” His response was “put me to sleep”.

Have you ever felt that you just wanted to close your eyes and shut the world out? Most people do this everyday and all day for their whole lives. The ways we do it are varied yet the results are the same. The small glimmers of sunshine in our lives such as our children, a conversation with a lover, personal success or a beautiful sunset are not enough to swing the pendulum in the other direction. I call this a passive way to kill yourself and only when the pendulum has swung too far in the negative direction do some people become actively suicidal and possibly complete the act.

For so many this passivity is so encompassing that they are not even aware that they are doing it and the rut they have dug is so worn and grooved, that they think the light doesn’t get in anymore. They have shut down all their desires and wants and sublimated this energy into socially acceptable things. I accept that many people do not realise that they are just existing and for some there can be intrusive and niggling thoughts that perhaps there is more, or others are actively seeking answers. My question to you is, “where are you on this continuum?”

Leonard Cohen wrote ‘there is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.’ Cracks can have various names such as emotional eating, compulsions/addictions, pain, illness, self mutilation, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), criminal activity, speeding, dehydration, reckless behaviour etc. I consider these cracks to be our legitimate way to kill ourselves as it’s much easier to focus on the results of them that govern our lives rather than on the reasons we created or do them in the first place. They are the legitimate results we have taken up and not the cause of our woes, which have now become the problem.

These are how our light gets in and when we stop focussing on the crack and see the radiance we can change on the physical, emotional and spiritual levels. We are programmed to die from the moment we are born and most things we do in life are towards that end. We are so busy focussing on it unconsciously that we don’t comprehend that it’s what motivates us. At times in our lives or regularly for some they feel an increased sense of agitation. This agitation takes many forms, restlessness; sleeplessness; depression; inactivity and it is when we are in that state that we take action. For some it’s to down a bottle of Vodka and wipe themselves out, others may commit a crime so that someone else can take responsibility for them and some cut or mutilate themselves as that is easier to focus on and deal with than what is really going on inside of them.

Some choose this time to make positive changes in their lives and focus their energy creatively. I hope that if you are at this crossroad or in this agitated state you are reading this to challenge your thinking, expand your awareness and harness that energy into coming back to yourself. Getting into your body, feeling what is going on for you and taking responsibility for yourself to live whilst you’re alive rather than dying while you live.

Food for Thought

Wracklessness

Most people don’t allow themselves the time and stillness to become aware or reflect on their emotions and the resultant behaviour. They are too busy filling their day with tasks or compulsions … spending much of their time being curious about others lives rather than their own or in jobs that cause aggravation or grief. Using these distractions we choose to ignore our intuition that is our superficial gut information initially intended to protect us or remind us that we are not on the right path or using our time in ways that are not beneficial to us. We have all experienced situations in which the hairs stand up on the back of our necks … we have that strong gut feeling or an intense sense of just knowing that the situation we are in or place we’re at is not right. When we continue to ignore our intuition and unconsciously have recognised that we are not on our true path, this restless agitation I call wracklessness occurs. Wracklessness is also designed to safeguard us and more, it’s a wake up call that we are on the wrong course and in conflict with our soul’s purpose. Nelson Mandela said ‘There is no passion to be found playing small - in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living.’ Wracklessness tells us that we are capable of so much more.

The way some deal with wracklessness is to exacerbate the way we choose to die or opt out completely. Staying with this wracklessness can be a challenge and it is in these moments that my greatest awakenings and awareness’s have come. On occasions they produced learning’s I wasn’t aware of at the time and much later went ah ha! … now I know why I went through that.

On one such occurrence of wracklessness my immediate reaction was wracking sobs followed by telling myself the messages I had heard somewhere in my youth, ‘I am so stupid’. Considering food that I wanted immediately as a means of escaping myself was no longer fast enough. I needed an instant death, not gory dramatic stuff, just poof and gone ... bummer, I was still here. So being the naturally inquisitive person that I am … I began examining what was going on for me ... surely I am not Robinson Crusoe and others must feel this same wracklessness … what does it mean? After several days of plotting my own demise, I began to realise that my expedition in this world was now taking me in a new direction and I hadn’t been listening to the whispers … so I was now hearing the screams.

The ability to examine what is going on inside of us is of interest to us all. For some they have covered this awareness with layers of fat … others have drowned it in alcohol … numbed it with drugs … attempted to cut it out or opted out mentally. The deep connectedness we have ignored exerts its influence in this wracklessness and moves us if we are ready and willing towards our life’s purpose. Martin Luther King Jr. said ‘Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase.’ This faith can be incremental, one small step at a time, like a set of stairs we get to the top and there is a sigh … ‘phew we made it’ and we have for a time. Then we create circumstances to propel us upwards to the next step. This is more than a journey it’s an expedition and that expedition is all inwards and back to yourself.

copyright Veronica Grunbaum 12.02.2009

There are Reasons for Everything.

We do this because we don’t want to put in the effort to fix our relationship with others or ourselves … we don’t want to go to work and earn a living … it’s less threatening to stay in unhealthy relationships (working or personal) rather than be alone … we would rather receive attention for the situation we create and have others take responsibility for us. So we kill ourselves slowly or quickly in some cases … because it’s easy … easier than getting up and taking action … easier than spending time with ourselves … getting to know who we are … what we need to do for ourselves and to fix the situation we have created. The more we know and take responsibility for ourselves … the quicker we move towards who we are meant to be and have an awareness of what is going on around us. Walking around with blinkers on may be easy and although unsatisfying many choose to do it … we throw rubbish on the ground … because someone else will clean it up … we ignore people in need … because someone else will help … we do or say things that make us cringe on the inside … yet we do them anyway … quickly ignoring those brief pangs of hmmmm … was that the right thing to do? … Up until recently I worked in a hospital, to me turning off lights not in use was a really simple task and why do you need lights on to go to the toilet during the day (and to leave them on) never ceases to amaze me. Every night the offices, wards and other areas left lights on … because they expect someone else will turn them off ... and off course it’s not their money they are wasting … yet it is … it’s their tax dollars … yet do we think that big? We make things tougher for our parents … our partners … our community … our systems … ourselves ... because we constantly make choices based on what is easy … not what is ecological (good is for me; good for you and good for the planet).