First make sure your canvas is ready and prepared to receive the brush. Depending on what medium you plan to create with, this preparation may take more time on some surfaces than others.
We need a composition, and that composition must have rhythm, harmony and balance. Also we will decide the mood of this composition. Will it be cold and harsh, or hot and temperate, maybe even clammy? Or will it be lighthearted and fun? Maybe heavy and painful, whatever mood you like to play in at this time. This is part of deciding what message we want to convey for our audience. For this example lets say we are painting with oil as a medium, or something similar that flows easily.
After we have an idea of the composition in our mind, we then begin to make sure that the canvas is wet and slippery so the pigment will blend well and there are no obvious signs of interruption from one stage to the other.
We now need to cover the background with a color, and that will be done with a wash of some sort. Licking the whole canvas with whatever you may use to apply the wash. Some parts of the canvas may need a more thorough washing than others. This is the beginning of the attention to detail. It is important to have some idea in your minds eye where you are going at all times.. so you can prepare for the next layer of color seamlessly. This will help you predict what brush you need as well as what technique your piece will command.
Often this will call for using something other than just the tip of the brush, I.E. the ferrule or the shaft or maybe even the butt of the brush. You may even find that other tools are helpful as well. And as you can imagine the mood of the composition as well as the willingness of the canvas to receive the pigment, will determine the power of which the stokes are made. This process will be repeated many times over as we go through the color ranges, and the different subjects in our composition. Remember to take time and pay close attention to all the details. Your goal is to make your audience feel the most that they can feel. Your duty as an artist is to bring out emotion. After a while and through what hopefully is a fun precess, your composition should begin to resemble what you had in mind ...or at least close to it. It is now time to add the highlights. The highlights are the part of the work that make it come to life. Often highlights (the whites) should be painted with absolutely no restraint or restriction. Keep stroking until the highlights have all been exhausted. After the climax of the whole composition... assuming that you felt good about your project... you may feel exhausted. But soon you will be inspired to paint the canvas over or maybe go on to the next canvas depending on what kind of showing you are having.
Thanks for reading...
Happy Art.
~J~
3.8.04
Life, Death, and Suicide
Some Thoughts About It.
I believe that life is rare and precious. And the odds against life in this universe, taking all the things that science knows into consideration are overwhelmingly high. It is much nearer to impossible than possible for life to exist in this universe as we understand it. So why have we been blessed with it? The only answer that I can find is that we possess life simply because God ( or whatever you have) decided that against all the odds, somehow for some reason just deserve it. Yes, we are so special in the eyes of God that he decided to bless us with this so very fragile, precious, rare, and special gift of life. No different than any blade of grass or any bug or any creature in the sea, we all share the common blessing of a deserved life and we are part of the web of collective consciousness.
Why then, if life is so special does it become so painful and so hard to live? Even though we have been given this life, it is up to us to maintain it. To maintain it we need a balance of health in body, mind, and spirit, all of which need to be exercised regularly. But the keyword is balance.
All in all most life on this planet goes on as expected. The big fish eat the little fish and on and on. If we do good things we get good things and sometimes bad things happen to good lives. But for the most part, life goes on as it should taking the laws of physics, the laws of God into account. Sometimes life is exceptionally hard because it is out of balance. The more out of balance you get the harder it becomes. There are whole regions of this planet that are out of balance. They pay a price. There is a whole generation getting out of balance and it too will pay a price. The price is hardship and toil. The bible calls them curses. But even with that, there is plenty of good in this world.
Now and again a new life comes along that is disfigured. This life has a difficult time in its environment and it will probably die if it can not adapt to its immediate environment. We can see this when it happens physically, but we can't see it easily when it happens mentally or emotionally. We become perplexed and we wonder why such a life dies when we see no obvious reason.
There are emotional and mental deformities that are as severe and crippling as physical deformities, making the ability to exist nearly, if not impossible. A deformed life may well survive but be crippled and disadvantage and never fend for itself very well. Generally to die sooner than its siblings or peers. This is understood in the adage "culling the herd" where the less adapted get eaten by the more adapted or get killed by the forces of nature. This "law of the jungle" doesn't usually come to mind when we're talking about humans with emotional or mental issues.
Sometimes people are born with mental and emotional deformities ( from moron to super-genius) that prevent them from ever-adapting to the social environment that they were born into. Consequently winding up with a very poor quality of life and eventually an early death for any number of reasons. As a rule, when we try and step in and repair any birth defect we usually do little if any good and often make the situations worse. Mental and emotional deformities can be difficult to see or diagnose much less fix.
Some with deformities know or feel they have them and can still have an instinctual ability to survive. However, others also know they are different and know they have an instinctual desire to die.
Some physical deformities leave the body, brain or maybe the nervous system exposed or too vulnerable making them too sensitive to survive. Emotional deformities or even mental deformities can't be just as debilitating.
If a person is not born crippled they can become so in the course of their life. It is possible to receive so much stimulation that eventually it breaks the psyche or mind and death is the most humane option. When the decision to die has been reached from one that has been permanently emotionally crippled I believe this should be considered a natural decision. A decision that benefits all concerned especially the afflicted.
There are always those that can come up with some theoretical or ideological way to solve every problem that someone else has. Most of the time they are not enough. And sometimes suicide is just simply the most humane option. Our society in general works on this principle. For instance, I am a liver disease patient and a lung patient, and because I have no family or permanent support system the powers that be have decided that I do not qualify for either transplant. But I wouldn't want it any other way because the quality of life is really what it's about anyway.
I try hard to look at both sides of the suicide issue and I just don't see how anyone can come out with any other conclusion than emotional pain is as crippling as physical pain. And maybe in reality even more disabling. And at times is too much to live with.
Our life is not for others though, it is for ourselves and when we live in harmony with others we find harmony in ourselves. And if someone finds themselves out of harmony and wants to pass this life and go on to the next one, then that is their choice. This choice is a God-given unalienable right and they deserve no criticism for their choice. The ones that want to die and leave this material world do not try and save you from living. For you deserve to have that choice without interference or interruption. If one feels a need to communicate about their choice to get on that bus (commit suicide) then let them do so in peace without fear of ridicule, or arrest or incarceration, or restraint of any kind. It simply is not your place to interrupt someone's death any more than it would be someone else's place to interrupt you in your living or contemplation of your living. To interrupt is to assume that person's feelings and thoughts have no validity. Just because one is feeling suicidal in no way means that they can't or shouldn't think and feel for themselves. This is critical: An interruption of the natural thought and feeling process of that person at that time will in all probability result in frustration and their inability to think things through, consequently winding up with fragmented thoughts and feelings that are impossible to reassemble in a coherent order that could have otherwise created a solution. Now left with no hope because of the chain of events created by the interruption or intervention. Now that person has little choice but to end their life. All that can be been done for certain is the postponement of the suicide. Had the person been allowed to think and feel it out, the suicide may very well have been prevented. But nothing is crueler than forcing one to suffer by stopping them from going through a natural thought process to weigh their options.
When a person gets to the point they want to die they are not losers, nor are they weak nor wrong and they are not stupid. They are hurting and they are feeling many different and scary things some of which they can't identify, yet strong enough to bear what others may not even know to exist and in most cases can not imagine it.
Each suicide has something unique about it -as each life has something unique about it. Your life is yours and your death is also going to be yours. It could be possible that your life may not be yours, but your death will not belong to anyone else. Life can be anonymous. If you live with others, you can compromise too much, you can imitate -but death is always unique because death is alone. You die alone. There is no society. They don't exist in your death. The crowd, the mass is there when you are alive, but when you die you die alone, utterly alone. Death has a quality. So sometimes it happens that a man may commit suicide because he has become tired of the anonymous existence. He has become tired of all the compromises that one has to make to live. That's why Van Gogh committed suicide - he was a rare man, one of the greatest painters ever. But he had to make compromises every moment of his life. He got tired of those compromises; he could no longer tolerate being part of the crowd mind. He killed himself to be himself. If he had been in the East there would have been another alternative: suicide or sannyas. These are the two alternatives which every man who has some sense of life, of individuality, has to choose between at some point. In the West, nothing like sannyas has been in existence. If you become a Christian monk that is again a compromise; you remain part of the society. Even if you go out of society you remain part of it. Society goes on controlling you -it has a remote control system. It does not allow you to go out of it. You remain a Christian, you remain a Catholic, even when you have moved to a monastery. It does not make much difference. In the East, sannyas have a different flavor. The moment you become sannyasin you are no longer a Hindu, you are no longer a Mohammedan, you are no longer a Christian. The moment you become a sannyasin, you drop out of all collectivities. You become yourself. You will be surprised to know that in the East people don't commit suicide as much as in the West. And the difference is big -too big to be just accidental. In the East they have created a creative kind of suicide, that is sannyas. You can still live, but you can live in your way. Then the need for suicide disappears or becomes very much less. In the West, it always has happened that unique individuals have to commit suicide. The mediocre go on living, the unique have to commit suicide. A Van Gogh, a Hemingway, a Mayakovski, a Nijinsky -these are unique individuals. Either they have to commit suicide or they have to go mad -society drives them mad. Society puts so much pressure on them that either they have to yield to society and become just anonymous, or they have to go mad, or they have to commit suicide. And all are destructive alternatives. Nietzsche went mad; that was his way of committing suicide. Nijinsky had the same quality as Buddha. Had he been in the East he would have become a Buddha, but the west does not give any alternative at all. He had to go mad. Van Gogh had a unique quality of tremendous intelligence, creativity. He could have moved on the path of sannyas and samadhi, but there was no door open. He got tired; just going on living a compromise was hurting too much. It was not worth it. One day he completed his painting -the painting that he had always wanted to do -and that day he felt, "Now there is no need to make any compromise with anybody for any reason. I have done my painting, I have done my best. It is time to disappear". He had always wanted to paint a sunrise. He had painted sunrises for years, but still, something was missing and lacking and he would paint again and again. The day his painting was complete and he was fulfilled and satisfied and contented that it had happened -that very moment it was absolutely clear to him that now there was no need-"I was only waiting for this painting, I am fulfilled in it, I have bloomed. Now why make compromises? For what? He committed suicide. He was not mad, he was simply not mediocre. His suicide was not a crime, his suicide was simply a condemnation of your so-called society which asks for so many compromises. Mediocre people are ready to compromise; they have nothing to lose. They feel good being part of a crowd, of a mob, because in the crowd they need not think about themselves as mediocre; all are just like them. They can lose themselves in the crowd. They can lose themselves and forget themselves in the mass mind, and in the mass mind, they have no responsibility. They need not bother whether they are asleep or awakened. But a man who has some soul in him will find it continuously heavy to go on degrading himself, to go on compromising for small ordinary trivia, meaningless things -for bread and butter, for a house, a shelter, for clothes.....
But each suicide will have a different quality to it. You ask why Hemingway committed suicide. Hemingway's suicide has another flavor, different from Van Gogh's. Hemingway's whole search was the search for freedom. The birth happened; it was not your choice. You were thrown into it, it was not your choice. Nobody ever asked you whether you wanted to be born or not. So birth is not freedom. It has already happened. The next most important thing is love, but that is also not possible to do. When it happens, it happens; you cannot manage it, you cannot will it. If you want to love a person just through will, it is impossible. It happens when it happens -suddenly you are in love. That's why we use the phrase "falling in love". You ''fall" into it. But you cannot will it; it comes from the unknown. It is just like birth. It is as if God manages that you fall in love with this person; it is as if the decision comes from the blue. You are not the decisive factor, you are more like a victim. You cannot do anything against it. If it happens you have to go into it; if it does not happen you can do whatsoever you want and it will not happen. Nobody can produce love on order. And the most important three things in life are birth, love, death.
Death is the only thing that you can do something about -you can commit suicide. Hemingway's search was for freedom. He wanted to do something that he had not done. He had not managed birth, he had not managed love, now there was only death. There was only one thing which if you wanted to do, you could do. It would be your act, an individual act, done by you. Death has a mysterious quality about it; it is a very strange paradox. If you are standing by the side of a small baby, just born, and if somebody asks you to say something certain about the baby -the baby is in his crib, asleep, relaxing -what can you say with certainty? You can say only one thing; that he will die.
That is a very strange thing to say. Anything else is uncertain. He may love, he may not love. He may succeed, he may fail. He may be a sinner, he may be a saint. All are "maybe's", there is nothing certain about anything. It is not possible to predict anything. There is only one thing you can say -and it looks very absurd at the side of a baby who has just been born -only one thing is certain: that he will die. This prediction can be made, and your prediction is never going to be wrong.
So death has a certain quality of certainty about it -it is going to happen. And at the same time is has something uncertain about it too. One never knows when it is going to happen. There is the certainty that it is going to happen. Both this certainty and uncertainty about death make it a mystery, a paradox. If you go living, it will happen -but then again it will come from out of the blue. You will not be the decisive factor. The birth happened, love happened -was death also to happen? That made Hemingway uneasy. He wanted to do at least one thing in life to which he could have his signature, about which he could say "This I did". That's why he committed suicide. Suicide was an exercise in freedom.
You cannot know anything about death unless you go into it. Hemingway's attitude was that if it is going to happen then why be dragged into it? Why not go into it on your own? It is going to happen. His whole life's concern was death, that's why he become so interested in bullfights. Death was very close. He was constantly attracted by the theme of death -what it was. But you cannot know. Even if somebody is dying in front of you, you don't know anything about death. You simply know that the breathing has disappeared, that this man's eyes won't open again, that this man will never speak again, that his heart is no longer beating -that's all. But this is nothing. How can you know about death from these things? The mystery remains a mystery, you have not even touched it. You can know it only by going into it. But if you are dragged into it there are more possibilities of your becoming unconscious -because you are being dragged into it. Almost always people die unconsciously. Before death happens they become so afraid, so very afraid, that a kind of coma surrounds them and protects them. It is a natural anesthetic. When you go for an operation, you need an anesthetic -and death is the greatest operation there is: the soul and body will be torn apart. So nature has some built-in mechanism -before you start dying you go into a coma; all consciousness disappears. In the first place, your consciousness was not very much. Even while you were alive, it was just a tiny flicker. When the wind of death comes, that flicker is gone- there is complete darkness. Hemingway wanted to go into death fully conscious. It was a conscious exercise in dying. But that is possible only through suicide or through samadhi. These are the only two possibilities. You can die consciously in only two ways. You can commit suicide; you can manage your death. You can have your revolver ready, contemplate it, put it on your chest or your head, pull the trigger yourself consciously, see the explosion and see death. This is one possibility. It is a very destructive possibility. Another possibility is to go more and more into meditation, to attain a state of awareness that cannot be drowned by death. Then there is no need to commit suicide. then whenever death comes, let it come. You will be dying fully alert, aware, watchful. So it is suicide or sannyas or samadhi. I'm not talking about all suicides -but you asked about these two. There are many ways to commit suicide. But these two are very rare. These two are very potential. If Vincent van Gogh or Hemingway had been in the East or had had the eastern attitude, they would have flowered as great sannyasins.
Below this is directed to ASHers, however it applies to anyone.
Suicide is a viable solution to some.
There are many many things one needs to consider before finally deciding to take their own life. That of course is contingent on the complexity of said life. It more than likely took years to conclude to commit suicide and will probably take years to wade through the process of finally deciding to do so. I suppose that there is no choice to live or die, you see some of us are already dead or dying in our spirit, that is why we are here. We are existing in limbo, a purgatory, a place a lot closer to hell than many might imagine. I will concede that more than likely but not always, whatever brought us here was brought on by our actions but the consequences are out of our control and we want the final say for where we sit. It appears that most suicidal people are accountable for their situation. One gets the idea that trolls don't or can't imagine that others may have good minds in most cases and are perfectly capable of thinking for themselves about this issue of suicide.
Granted some come to the bus stop for a short time and have temporary problems that at the time seem overwhelming but do fix themselves through the vicissitudes of life. Those will go on to live.
Often the suicide hotlines and counselors will take credit for saving one when in reality they've done nothing and possibly made it worse. After all, they need to justify their paycheck.
But some of us will only find peace in death. I guess the adage about walking a mile in one's shoes may apply.
Sitting on this fence or waiting for this bus or any other analogy that fits is just a place to contemplate, examine our lives thus far and get some thoughts together. Kind of like that first smoke and cup of coffee in the morning while trying to decide what will happen the rest of the day.
Maybe I am afraid to die, but I know and more importantly, I feel as if I should get on that bus soon. Not that I want to, I actually love living, however, I do understand things in this world well enough to see that I have nothing to contribute or to build a meaningful existence, and staying here is doing nothing more than wasting precious resources. And that fills me with guilt.
It is hard to believe that when one reads some of the posts on Alt Suicide Holiday that they can't be compassionate to the immense pain and suffering going on in the hearts of many. How is this any different than physical suffering? Sure it can be covered with drugs but hell that is worse than death. I know because I have probably tried every concoction of street drug known to man to cover the pain of sickness and guilt and memories and disappointments. And no drug has made me feel worse than the first morning after my first Paxil, save a forced injection of Haldol or Thorazine. Many in the ASH group have experienced the same thing.
Maybe it was the way a business went bad or a marriage or a lover, maybe it was the loss of a chance to fulfill a dream. Maybe it was something they did that they can't or don't feel they can live with any longer. Maybe it was all of the above and more. Who knows. And who knows what brings an individual here to ASH. The thing is, they're here. They are hurting and they have a solution. It may not be from the same set of values and standards as most of the first world's population. The ASHers have tried to segregate themselves by creating a place for themselves in our newsgroup. When people that do not have that particular set of standards and values come in here they will indeed read things that they do not understand and will get their feelings ruffled up a bit. They will try to intervene and in the process insult and do far more damage than they do good like most suicide prevention counselors do on any given day. It isn't possible to tell another person what they're feeling much less the intensity of those feelings. I have personally never met a counselor or shrink who didn't leave me with the bitter taste of holier than thou. The world is full of educated idiots.
Simular standards and values with the people around us have a lot to do with the overall happiness and quality of our lives. I would say as much as 90% of what we feel. One can only get let down so often before the critical threshold is reached and we quit trying to sustain a positive self-image. This is again different for each of us and again it is contingent on standards and values.
I would find it shocking if ever there was one person that wanted to die from the moment of birth. It takes a lot of conflicts to deteriorate the will to survive ( the strongest intuitive desire we have is of survival.) and the love for life. As I write this, out the window I hear a young girl maybe six or so. She is yelling to her Dad as they are walking to school "I love you, Bucko!" There is so much love and trust in her precious voice and I have to wonder if the day will come when she will have lost that particular love for life. That excitement and passion to go on. What in the world got us from that to here? Whatever it was, it sure had to be damned painful to kill that precious spirit. Yet it happens every day and has happened to many of us.
ASH is a good place, and it is needed. That is evident by the fact that people come here. I believe too that the spirit of ASH is extremely valuable. It helps those that want to die understand their feelings and it helps those that are truly on the fence make a decision. Contrary to the naysayers' ASH saves a lot of lives, by giving the broken a place to vent in an atmosphere that should not be hostile. Many of you that offer advice to the suicidal are extremely tough people. Some have had more in your life than most and you have been given a tremendous ability to handle the toughest that this life can deal out. And you have made life better for yourselves. Your trials and tribulations have given you the fuel and the drive to be better and you have succeeded. But not everybody is as resilient and as tough as you are. And many of you have gained a lot of wisdom in your trek through your life. But that does not mean that suicidal people are lesser for their abilities or lack of them. It just means that they are different and have a different set of strengths and weaknesses. And you might consider the fact that many have had great success at some point in their lives and they have overcome many trials and heartaches that life has put before them. There is that proverbial straw for some of us and it has broken the camel's back and with that our desire to exist. How do you know what we have lost or what we have gone through? Where does it say that our lives have to be just like yours? Maybe at this time, all we can do is nothing. When each of us is ready an action will be made. Until then being an ASHer is a good thing to do.
I have been deeply involved with a lot of suicidal people over the years, and I do not agree that the families nor anyone else left behind are the victims. I believe the families and so-called friends and or acquaintances in many cases are the reason why people choose suicide. The family members feel guilty because they are guilty. They are guilty of abuse, guilty of neglect, compassion, empathy on who knows how many different levels. They weren't there with empathy, compassion, or any type of understanding when the real victim. (the one that is dead) needed them. The survivors are guilty of emotional abandonment. Pure and simple they dropped the ball and could not muster the ability to be a friend or even a decent caretaker. But they are very quick to cry that they are the real victims...well that's just preposterous. They are no more the victim than Charley Manson was the victim.
Moreover, it is apparent when you talk to one of these so-called victims that they know their part in the suicide. They did have a choice to care or not care, to love or not love, to be there or not to be there, to keep trying or not, and they gave up. The proof is in the coffin. I don't have sympathy for a person who watches another human being's hope dissipate and does nothing to encourage any further hope. Instead, most so-called victims or (god I hate this word...survivor) of a suicidal are judgmental and selfish as to think they can in some way tell another human what to think and more importantly what to feel, then treat them in the way that brings forth the opposite feelings.
And I believe there is a lot of money in these so-called suicide survivor/victim organizations and that is why they even exist. To even have a board for an organization like that, suggest criminal conspiracy. Emotional blackmail of sorts. You pay us and you can come here and talk about your crime of neglect. What good could they possibly do? They don't prevent suicide, we know that is impossible because once a person decides it's a done deal. The question is when. It's murderers who used emotional torture as a weapon sitting around comparing notes on how they feel? What's the point? They did their job. They can paint another icon of the door of their car and go back to whatever they were doing when the person that needed them was suffering and crying for help.
John
"I didn't get the life I wanted and I can't live the life I got." SCP RIP
I believe that life is rare and precious. And the odds against life in this universe, taking all the things that science knows into consideration are overwhelmingly high. It is much nearer to impossible than possible for life to exist in this universe as we understand it. So why have we been blessed with it? The only answer that I can find is that we possess life simply because God ( or whatever you have) decided that against all the odds, somehow for some reason just deserve it. Yes, we are so special in the eyes of God that he decided to bless us with this so very fragile, precious, rare, and special gift of life. No different than any blade of grass or any bug or any creature in the sea, we all share the common blessing of a deserved life and we are part of the web of collective consciousness.
Why then, if life is so special does it become so painful and so hard to live? Even though we have been given this life, it is up to us to maintain it. To maintain it we need a balance of health in body, mind, and spirit, all of which need to be exercised regularly. But the keyword is balance.
All in all most life on this planet goes on as expected. The big fish eat the little fish and on and on. If we do good things we get good things and sometimes bad things happen to good lives. But for the most part, life goes on as it should taking the laws of physics, the laws of God into account. Sometimes life is exceptionally hard because it is out of balance. The more out of balance you get the harder it becomes. There are whole regions of this planet that are out of balance. They pay a price. There is a whole generation getting out of balance and it too will pay a price. The price is hardship and toil. The bible calls them curses. But even with that, there is plenty of good in this world.
Now and again a new life comes along that is disfigured. This life has a difficult time in its environment and it will probably die if it can not adapt to its immediate environment. We can see this when it happens physically, but we can't see it easily when it happens mentally or emotionally. We become perplexed and we wonder why such a life dies when we see no obvious reason.
There are emotional and mental deformities that are as severe and crippling as physical deformities, making the ability to exist nearly, if not impossible. A deformed life may well survive but be crippled and disadvantage and never fend for itself very well. Generally to die sooner than its siblings or peers. This is understood in the adage "culling the herd" where the less adapted get eaten by the more adapted or get killed by the forces of nature. This "law of the jungle" doesn't usually come to mind when we're talking about humans with emotional or mental issues.
Sometimes people are born with mental and emotional deformities ( from moron to super-genius) that prevent them from ever-adapting to the social environment that they were born into. Consequently winding up with a very poor quality of life and eventually an early death for any number of reasons. As a rule, when we try and step in and repair any birth defect we usually do little if any good and often make the situations worse. Mental and emotional deformities can be difficult to see or diagnose much less fix.
Some with deformities know or feel they have them and can still have an instinctual ability to survive. However, others also know they are different and know they have an instinctual desire to die.
Some physical deformities leave the body, brain or maybe the nervous system exposed or too vulnerable making them too sensitive to survive. Emotional deformities or even mental deformities can't be just as debilitating.
If a person is not born crippled they can become so in the course of their life. It is possible to receive so much stimulation that eventually it breaks the psyche or mind and death is the most humane option. When the decision to die has been reached from one that has been permanently emotionally crippled I believe this should be considered a natural decision. A decision that benefits all concerned especially the afflicted.
There are always those that can come up with some theoretical or ideological way to solve every problem that someone else has. Most of the time they are not enough. And sometimes suicide is just simply the most humane option. Our society in general works on this principle. For instance, I am a liver disease patient and a lung patient, and because I have no family or permanent support system the powers that be have decided that I do not qualify for either transplant. But I wouldn't want it any other way because the quality of life is really what it's about anyway.
I try hard to look at both sides of the suicide issue and I just don't see how anyone can come out with any other conclusion than emotional pain is as crippling as physical pain. And maybe in reality even more disabling. And at times is too much to live with.
Our life is not for others though, it is for ourselves and when we live in harmony with others we find harmony in ourselves. And if someone finds themselves out of harmony and wants to pass this life and go on to the next one, then that is their choice. This choice is a God-given unalienable right and they deserve no criticism for their choice. The ones that want to die and leave this material world do not try and save you from living. For you deserve to have that choice without interference or interruption. If one feels a need to communicate about their choice to get on that bus (commit suicide) then let them do so in peace without fear of ridicule, or arrest or incarceration, or restraint of any kind. It simply is not your place to interrupt someone's death any more than it would be someone else's place to interrupt you in your living or contemplation of your living. To interrupt is to assume that person's feelings and thoughts have no validity. Just because one is feeling suicidal in no way means that they can't or shouldn't think and feel for themselves. This is critical: An interruption of the natural thought and feeling process of that person at that time will in all probability result in frustration and their inability to think things through, consequently winding up with fragmented thoughts and feelings that are impossible to reassemble in a coherent order that could have otherwise created a solution. Now left with no hope because of the chain of events created by the interruption or intervention. Now that person has little choice but to end their life. All that can be been done for certain is the postponement of the suicide. Had the person been allowed to think and feel it out, the suicide may very well have been prevented. But nothing is crueler than forcing one to suffer by stopping them from going through a natural thought process to weigh their options.
When a person gets to the point they want to die they are not losers, nor are they weak nor wrong and they are not stupid. They are hurting and they are feeling many different and scary things some of which they can't identify, yet strong enough to bear what others may not even know to exist and in most cases can not imagine it.
Each suicide has something unique about it -as each life has something unique about it. Your life is yours and your death is also going to be yours. It could be possible that your life may not be yours, but your death will not belong to anyone else. Life can be anonymous. If you live with others, you can compromise too much, you can imitate -but death is always unique because death is alone. You die alone. There is no society. They don't exist in your death. The crowd, the mass is there when you are alive, but when you die you die alone, utterly alone. Death has a quality. So sometimes it happens that a man may commit suicide because he has become tired of the anonymous existence. He has become tired of all the compromises that one has to make to live. That's why Van Gogh committed suicide - he was a rare man, one of the greatest painters ever. But he had to make compromises every moment of his life. He got tired of those compromises; he could no longer tolerate being part of the crowd mind. He killed himself to be himself. If he had been in the East there would have been another alternative: suicide or sannyas. These are the two alternatives which every man who has some sense of life, of individuality, has to choose between at some point. In the West, nothing like sannyas has been in existence. If you become a Christian monk that is again a compromise; you remain part of the society. Even if you go out of society you remain part of it. Society goes on controlling you -it has a remote control system. It does not allow you to go out of it. You remain a Christian, you remain a Catholic, even when you have moved to a monastery. It does not make much difference. In the East, sannyas have a different flavor. The moment you become sannyasin you are no longer a Hindu, you are no longer a Mohammedan, you are no longer a Christian. The moment you become a sannyasin, you drop out of all collectivities. You become yourself. You will be surprised to know that in the East people don't commit suicide as much as in the West. And the difference is big -too big to be just accidental. In the East they have created a creative kind of suicide, that is sannyas. You can still live, but you can live in your way. Then the need for suicide disappears or becomes very much less. In the West, it always has happened that unique individuals have to commit suicide. The mediocre go on living, the unique have to commit suicide. A Van Gogh, a Hemingway, a Mayakovski, a Nijinsky -these are unique individuals. Either they have to commit suicide or they have to go mad -society drives them mad. Society puts so much pressure on them that either they have to yield to society and become just anonymous, or they have to go mad, or they have to commit suicide. And all are destructive alternatives. Nietzsche went mad; that was his way of committing suicide. Nijinsky had the same quality as Buddha. Had he been in the East he would have become a Buddha, but the west does not give any alternative at all. He had to go mad. Van Gogh had a unique quality of tremendous intelligence, creativity. He could have moved on the path of sannyas and samadhi, but there was no door open. He got tired; just going on living a compromise was hurting too much. It was not worth it. One day he completed his painting -the painting that he had always wanted to do -and that day he felt, "Now there is no need to make any compromise with anybody for any reason. I have done my painting, I have done my best. It is time to disappear". He had always wanted to paint a sunrise. He had painted sunrises for years, but still, something was missing and lacking and he would paint again and again. The day his painting was complete and he was fulfilled and satisfied and contented that it had happened -that very moment it was absolutely clear to him that now there was no need-"I was only waiting for this painting, I am fulfilled in it, I have bloomed. Now why make compromises? For what? He committed suicide. He was not mad, he was simply not mediocre. His suicide was not a crime, his suicide was simply a condemnation of your so-called society which asks for so many compromises. Mediocre people are ready to compromise; they have nothing to lose. They feel good being part of a crowd, of a mob, because in the crowd they need not think about themselves as mediocre; all are just like them. They can lose themselves in the crowd. They can lose themselves and forget themselves in the mass mind, and in the mass mind, they have no responsibility. They need not bother whether they are asleep or awakened. But a man who has some soul in him will find it continuously heavy to go on degrading himself, to go on compromising for small ordinary trivia, meaningless things -for bread and butter, for a house, a shelter, for clothes.....
But each suicide will have a different quality to it. You ask why Hemingway committed suicide. Hemingway's suicide has another flavor, different from Van Gogh's. Hemingway's whole search was the search for freedom. The birth happened; it was not your choice. You were thrown into it, it was not your choice. Nobody ever asked you whether you wanted to be born or not. So birth is not freedom. It has already happened. The next most important thing is love, but that is also not possible to do. When it happens, it happens; you cannot manage it, you cannot will it. If you want to love a person just through will, it is impossible. It happens when it happens -suddenly you are in love. That's why we use the phrase "falling in love". You ''fall" into it. But you cannot will it; it comes from the unknown. It is just like birth. It is as if God manages that you fall in love with this person; it is as if the decision comes from the blue. You are not the decisive factor, you are more like a victim. You cannot do anything against it. If it happens you have to go into it; if it does not happen you can do whatsoever you want and it will not happen. Nobody can produce love on order. And the most important three things in life are birth, love, death.
Death is the only thing that you can do something about -you can commit suicide. Hemingway's search was for freedom. He wanted to do something that he had not done. He had not managed birth, he had not managed love, now there was only death. There was only one thing which if you wanted to do, you could do. It would be your act, an individual act, done by you. Death has a mysterious quality about it; it is a very strange paradox. If you are standing by the side of a small baby, just born, and if somebody asks you to say something certain about the baby -the baby is in his crib, asleep, relaxing -what can you say with certainty? You can say only one thing; that he will die.
That is a very strange thing to say. Anything else is uncertain. He may love, he may not love. He may succeed, he may fail. He may be a sinner, he may be a saint. All are "maybe's", there is nothing certain about anything. It is not possible to predict anything. There is only one thing you can say -and it looks very absurd at the side of a baby who has just been born -only one thing is certain: that he will die. This prediction can be made, and your prediction is never going to be wrong.
So death has a certain quality of certainty about it -it is going to happen. And at the same time is has something uncertain about it too. One never knows when it is going to happen. There is the certainty that it is going to happen. Both this certainty and uncertainty about death make it a mystery, a paradox. If you go living, it will happen -but then again it will come from out of the blue. You will not be the decisive factor. The birth happened, love happened -was death also to happen? That made Hemingway uneasy. He wanted to do at least one thing in life to which he could have his signature, about which he could say "This I did". That's why he committed suicide. Suicide was an exercise in freedom.
You cannot know anything about death unless you go into it. Hemingway's attitude was that if it is going to happen then why be dragged into it? Why not go into it on your own? It is going to happen. His whole life's concern was death, that's why he become so interested in bullfights. Death was very close. He was constantly attracted by the theme of death -what it was. But you cannot know. Even if somebody is dying in front of you, you don't know anything about death. You simply know that the breathing has disappeared, that this man's eyes won't open again, that this man will never speak again, that his heart is no longer beating -that's all. But this is nothing. How can you know about death from these things? The mystery remains a mystery, you have not even touched it. You can know it only by going into it. But if you are dragged into it there are more possibilities of your becoming unconscious -because you are being dragged into it. Almost always people die unconsciously. Before death happens they become so afraid, so very afraid, that a kind of coma surrounds them and protects them. It is a natural anesthetic. When you go for an operation, you need an anesthetic -and death is the greatest operation there is: the soul and body will be torn apart. So nature has some built-in mechanism -before you start dying you go into a coma; all consciousness disappears. In the first place, your consciousness was not very much. Even while you were alive, it was just a tiny flicker. When the wind of death comes, that flicker is gone- there is complete darkness. Hemingway wanted to go into death fully conscious. It was a conscious exercise in dying. But that is possible only through suicide or through samadhi. These are the only two possibilities. You can die consciously in only two ways. You can commit suicide; you can manage your death. You can have your revolver ready, contemplate it, put it on your chest or your head, pull the trigger yourself consciously, see the explosion and see death. This is one possibility. It is a very destructive possibility. Another possibility is to go more and more into meditation, to attain a state of awareness that cannot be drowned by death. Then there is no need to commit suicide. then whenever death comes, let it come. You will be dying fully alert, aware, watchful. So it is suicide or sannyas or samadhi. I'm not talking about all suicides -but you asked about these two. There are many ways to commit suicide. But these two are very rare. These two are very potential. If Vincent van Gogh or Hemingway had been in the East or had had the eastern attitude, they would have flowered as great sannyasins.
Below this is directed to ASHers, however it applies to anyone.
Suicide is a viable solution to some.
There are many many things one needs to consider before finally deciding to take their own life. That of course is contingent on the complexity of said life. It more than likely took years to conclude to commit suicide and will probably take years to wade through the process of finally deciding to do so. I suppose that there is no choice to live or die, you see some of us are already dead or dying in our spirit, that is why we are here. We are existing in limbo, a purgatory, a place a lot closer to hell than many might imagine. I will concede that more than likely but not always, whatever brought us here was brought on by our actions but the consequences are out of our control and we want the final say for where we sit. It appears that most suicidal people are accountable for their situation. One gets the idea that trolls don't or can't imagine that others may have good minds in most cases and are perfectly capable of thinking for themselves about this issue of suicide.
Granted some come to the bus stop for a short time and have temporary problems that at the time seem overwhelming but do fix themselves through the vicissitudes of life. Those will go on to live.
Often the suicide hotlines and counselors will take credit for saving one when in reality they've done nothing and possibly made it worse. After all, they need to justify their paycheck.
But some of us will only find peace in death. I guess the adage about walking a mile in one's shoes may apply.
Sitting on this fence or waiting for this bus or any other analogy that fits is just a place to contemplate, examine our lives thus far and get some thoughts together. Kind of like that first smoke and cup of coffee in the morning while trying to decide what will happen the rest of the day.
Maybe I am afraid to die, but I know and more importantly, I feel as if I should get on that bus soon. Not that I want to, I actually love living, however, I do understand things in this world well enough to see that I have nothing to contribute or to build a meaningful existence, and staying here is doing nothing more than wasting precious resources. And that fills me with guilt.
It is hard to believe that when one reads some of the posts on Alt Suicide Holiday that they can't be compassionate to the immense pain and suffering going on in the hearts of many. How is this any different than physical suffering? Sure it can be covered with drugs but hell that is worse than death. I know because I have probably tried every concoction of street drug known to man to cover the pain of sickness and guilt and memories and disappointments. And no drug has made me feel worse than the first morning after my first Paxil, save a forced injection of Haldol or Thorazine. Many in the ASH group have experienced the same thing.
Maybe it was the way a business went bad or a marriage or a lover, maybe it was the loss of a chance to fulfill a dream. Maybe it was something they did that they can't or don't feel they can live with any longer. Maybe it was all of the above and more. Who knows. And who knows what brings an individual here to ASH. The thing is, they're here. They are hurting and they have a solution. It may not be from the same set of values and standards as most of the first world's population. The ASHers have tried to segregate themselves by creating a place for themselves in our newsgroup. When people that do not have that particular set of standards and values come in here they will indeed read things that they do not understand and will get their feelings ruffled up a bit. They will try to intervene and in the process insult and do far more damage than they do good like most suicide prevention counselors do on any given day. It isn't possible to tell another person what they're feeling much less the intensity of those feelings. I have personally never met a counselor or shrink who didn't leave me with the bitter taste of holier than thou. The world is full of educated idiots.
Simular standards and values with the people around us have a lot to do with the overall happiness and quality of our lives. I would say as much as 90% of what we feel. One can only get let down so often before the critical threshold is reached and we quit trying to sustain a positive self-image. This is again different for each of us and again it is contingent on standards and values.
I would find it shocking if ever there was one person that wanted to die from the moment of birth. It takes a lot of conflicts to deteriorate the will to survive ( the strongest intuitive desire we have is of survival.) and the love for life. As I write this, out the window I hear a young girl maybe six or so. She is yelling to her Dad as they are walking to school "I love you, Bucko!" There is so much love and trust in her precious voice and I have to wonder if the day will come when she will have lost that particular love for life. That excitement and passion to go on. What in the world got us from that to here? Whatever it was, it sure had to be damned painful to kill that precious spirit. Yet it happens every day and has happened to many of us.
ASH is a good place, and it is needed. That is evident by the fact that people come here. I believe too that the spirit of ASH is extremely valuable. It helps those that want to die understand their feelings and it helps those that are truly on the fence make a decision. Contrary to the naysayers' ASH saves a lot of lives, by giving the broken a place to vent in an atmosphere that should not be hostile. Many of you that offer advice to the suicidal are extremely tough people. Some have had more in your life than most and you have been given a tremendous ability to handle the toughest that this life can deal out. And you have made life better for yourselves. Your trials and tribulations have given you the fuel and the drive to be better and you have succeeded. But not everybody is as resilient and as tough as you are. And many of you have gained a lot of wisdom in your trek through your life. But that does not mean that suicidal people are lesser for their abilities or lack of them. It just means that they are different and have a different set of strengths and weaknesses. And you might consider the fact that many have had great success at some point in their lives and they have overcome many trials and heartaches that life has put before them. There is that proverbial straw for some of us and it has broken the camel's back and with that our desire to exist. How do you know what we have lost or what we have gone through? Where does it say that our lives have to be just like yours? Maybe at this time, all we can do is nothing. When each of us is ready an action will be made. Until then being an ASHer is a good thing to do.
I have been deeply involved with a lot of suicidal people over the years, and I do not agree that the families nor anyone else left behind are the victims. I believe the families and so-called friends and or acquaintances in many cases are the reason why people choose suicide. The family members feel guilty because they are guilty. They are guilty of abuse, guilty of neglect, compassion, empathy on who knows how many different levels. They weren't there with empathy, compassion, or any type of understanding when the real victim. (the one that is dead) needed them. The survivors are guilty of emotional abandonment. Pure and simple they dropped the ball and could not muster the ability to be a friend or even a decent caretaker. But they are very quick to cry that they are the real victims...well that's just preposterous. They are no more the victim than Charley Manson was the victim.
Moreover, it is apparent when you talk to one of these so-called victims that they know their part in the suicide. They did have a choice to care or not care, to love or not love, to be there or not to be there, to keep trying or not, and they gave up. The proof is in the coffin. I don't have sympathy for a person who watches another human being's hope dissipate and does nothing to encourage any further hope. Instead, most so-called victims or (god I hate this word...survivor) of a suicidal are judgmental and selfish as to think they can in some way tell another human what to think and more importantly what to feel, then treat them in the way that brings forth the opposite feelings.
And I believe there is a lot of money in these so-called suicide survivor/victim organizations and that is why they even exist. To even have a board for an organization like that, suggest criminal conspiracy. Emotional blackmail of sorts. You pay us and you can come here and talk about your crime of neglect. What good could they possibly do? They don't prevent suicide, we know that is impossible because once a person decides it's a done deal. The question is when. It's murderers who used emotional torture as a weapon sitting around comparing notes on how they feel? What's the point? They did their job. They can paint another icon of the door of their car and go back to whatever they were doing when the person that needed them was suffering and crying for help.
John
"I didn't get the life I wanted and I can't live the life I got." SCP RIP
16.6.04
Happiness
Happiness is not going to just happen. Sorry but it's true. You can't luck up on it, you can't hunt it down and capture it, nor will you gamble and get it. And no matter how powerful you think you are you still can't demand or command it. Happiness will give no credit to what happens around us. It is only a result of how we react to the stimuli around us. Happiness has to be made, it comes from preparation and conditioning, and most of all it has to be maintained. Like a fortress, you must defend the borders of your own happiness.
The quality of our lives is contingent upon the way that we learn to control our inner experiences. The challenge becomes, to act, not to react.
If we continue to do the easy in our lives, the easy becomes hard.
If we do the hard things daily they soon become easy.
Being selfless is hard at first, then it becomes second nature and when we are confronted with opposition we are at peace, because we know that we have been in harmony with the natural order of God. ( No peace= no God, Know peace=know God )
It's easy to find faults in others and to be unhappy of our circumstances regardless of how rich we may look or feel. It is usually those who have suffered the most that are the kindest, most optimistic. For they truly see their blessings.
Who has suffered the most. A person that looses a job, or a person that looses a company that employees others who in turn loose their jobs? True grace comes from the appreciation of the living spirit. The thanks for the special gift of life. Not just our own lives but all life.
We have to learn to be thankful in the diverse gratification, and we need to resist instant gratification. This may seem awkward until you try it, and even then it takes a year or so to get used to. But, you will find many blessings in the ability to resist temptation.
Acting without thought is reacting and you have no control over anything at that point. What's worse is that, all can witness it and your grace and charm go out the window.
No more pretty is as pretty does.
It only takes one mistake to foul a thousand achievements.
It is not for others though, it is for ourselves and when we live in harmony with others we find harmony in self.
The last thought on this will be;
" A human being is part of the whole,
called by us the "Universe". A part limited in time and space. We experience our ourselves,our thoughts and feelings as something separate from the rest. this is a sort of delusion of our consciousness.. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, it restricts us to our personal
desires and to affection for a few people that are nearest to us. Our task is free ourselves from this prison." (Albert Einstein)
The quality of our lives is contingent upon the way that we learn to control our inner experiences. The challenge becomes, to act, not to react.
If we continue to do the easy in our lives, the easy becomes hard.
If we do the hard things daily they soon become easy.
Being selfless is hard at first, then it becomes second nature and when we are confronted with opposition we are at peace, because we know that we have been in harmony with the natural order of God. ( No peace= no God, Know peace=know God )
It's easy to find faults in others and to be unhappy of our circumstances regardless of how rich we may look or feel. It is usually those who have suffered the most that are the kindest, most optimistic. For they truly see their blessings.
Who has suffered the most. A person that looses a job, or a person that looses a company that employees others who in turn loose their jobs? True grace comes from the appreciation of the living spirit. The thanks for the special gift of life. Not just our own lives but all life.
We have to learn to be thankful in the diverse gratification, and we need to resist instant gratification. This may seem awkward until you try it, and even then it takes a year or so to get used to. But, you will find many blessings in the ability to resist temptation.
Acting without thought is reacting and you have no control over anything at that point. What's worse is that, all can witness it and your grace and charm go out the window.
No more pretty is as pretty does.
It only takes one mistake to foul a thousand achievements.
It is not for others though, it is for ourselves and when we live in harmony with others we find harmony in self.
The last thought on this will be;
" A human being is part of the whole,
called by us the "Universe". A part limited in time and space. We experience our ourselves,our thoughts and feelings as something separate from the rest. this is a sort of delusion of our consciousness.. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, it restricts us to our personal
desires and to affection for a few people that are nearest to us. Our task is free ourselves from this prison." (Albert Einstein)
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