Unlike many I am an avid avoider of most newspapers and news programmes. I do not want to know the recent gossip, see the newest loss of virtue, plunges into fatness or fashion feaux pars. I would rather not hear the death and destruction wrought on countries and it’s citizens by terrorists or war. I would rather keep my knowledge down to more local and happier/balanced accounts of what is going on in the world and avoid the emotional upheaval that come with such inflammatory accounts of what is happening, of what is important and what is considered entertaining. I am just not interested in getting all het up about things I cannot change that are so upsetting or humiliating. But there comes a point where I am made aware of some things.
I refer to the suicide of Robin Williams. It saddens me to feel that so many peoples responses to the news was to be angry or feel for the living. To hear, ‘they shouldn’t have had to find him like that’, and ‘they will remember that for the rest of their lives’ I feel a great remorse that they have missed the really tragedy. A human being felt so much misery, pain, hopelessness that they felt the only answer to their problem was to not be alive any more.
I do not wish to speculate as to why he or anyone else feels the need to not be anymore because from my own experiences I know there are a multitude of reasons and none of them in the cold light of day will be understood by anyone other than the person concerned. I certainly don’t wish to convey that to be no more is an answer to anything. Life is so rich, and wondrous that I cannot but lament that so many people are in such pain and suffering. It is not achievements that make you happy, it is not having people around, nor any single one thing that makes you content or happy but a mixture and although you may have so little, or have the world tell you you have achieved nothing it is not true.
To live is amazing but it can take more than just being alive to feel it is worth it and I am saddened that when so many do not understand why a star such as Robin Williams might want to die, that you cannot see that it is not his achievements in your eyes that count. It is not what you might feel or think about his life either, it is about what he thought and felt.
So many of us do not notice the achievements we make, the good that we do and really when such accounts come out it is all too easy to compare and try and explain and really it is quite easy to focus on the negative aspects. I am not a fan of making a big deal of it because in celebrating his life you are running the risk of people thinking ‘well if he didn’t make it with all he achieved then how can I. With all his money and access to help he lost his battle then what hope is there for me.’
When you are in a place of despair I can see it as quite easy to go further down.
We need to talk yeah sure but to have it all over the news and then used by big charities to raise awareness I wonder if it is such a good idea. But then I guess the loss of a friend 4 years ago who was not a celebrity, who put in his hours and spent what he had to enjoy his life, with no wife or children and nothing outstanding to his name other than not being in debt I am particularly sensitive to this discussion.
I miss my friend and when so many people are arguing about how it got to this stage I fear they are missing the point.
We need to look after each other, we need to really ask how we are feeling and really listen to the answers. That we need to remind each other of our worth and theirs, of what we achieve and show gratitude for each other so that we all know who and what we are and that we are all worth it. And lastly that life keeps on changing so although it may be bleak right now it will change, and it will get better.
I refer to the suicide of Robin Williams. It saddens me to feel that so many peoples responses to the news was to be angry or feel for the living. To hear, ‘they shouldn’t have had to find him like that’, and ‘they will remember that for the rest of their lives’ I feel a great remorse that they have missed the really tragedy. A human being felt so much misery, pain, hopelessness that they felt the only answer to their problem was to not be alive any more.
I do not wish to speculate as to why he or anyone else feels the need to not be anymore because from my own experiences I know there are a multitude of reasons and none of them in the cold light of day will be understood by anyone other than the person concerned. I certainly don’t wish to convey that to be no more is an answer to anything. Life is so rich, and wondrous that I cannot but lament that so many people are in such pain and suffering. It is not achievements that make you happy, it is not having people around, nor any single one thing that makes you content or happy but a mixture and although you may have so little, or have the world tell you you have achieved nothing it is not true.
To live is amazing but it can take more than just being alive to feel it is worth it and I am saddened that when so many do not understand why a star such as Robin Williams might want to die, that you cannot see that it is not his achievements in your eyes that count. It is not what you might feel or think about his life either, it is about what he thought and felt.
So many of us do not notice the achievements we make, the good that we do and really when such accounts come out it is all too easy to compare and try and explain and really it is quite easy to focus on the negative aspects. I am not a fan of making a big deal of it because in celebrating his life you are running the risk of people thinking ‘well if he didn’t make it with all he achieved then how can I. With all his money and access to help he lost his battle then what hope is there for me.’
When you are in a place of despair I can see it as quite easy to go further down.
Do those who are struggling really need it to be made into such a big thing?
We need to talk yeah sure but to have it all over the news and then used by big charities to raise awareness I wonder if it is such a good idea. But then I guess the loss of a friend 4 years ago who was not a celebrity, who put in his hours and spent what he had to enjoy his life, with no wife or children and nothing outstanding to his name other than not being in debt I am particularly sensitive to this discussion.
I miss my friend and when so many people are arguing about how it got to this stage I fear they are missing the point.
We need to look after each other, we need to really ask how we are feeling and really listen to the answers. That we need to remind each other of our worth and theirs, of what we achieve and show gratitude for each other so that we all know who and what we are and that we are all worth it. And lastly that life keeps on changing so although it may be bleak right now it will change, and it will get better.
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