Heart: There is nothing left for happiness.
Mind: What about job satisfaction?
Heart: What about it? They won't miss you. They will continue.
Mind: What about family?
Heart: The ones you have hurt and disappointed? Would it truly matter?
Mind: I think so, besides, God has always been around.
Heart: The one you run from and doubt? Do you think he truly cares now?
This was an on going thing for me on a daily basis. Trying to find a reason to go on in life. A reason to keep myself alive. I needed a reason to live. A purpose to carry on past the current day. It was easy to stay alive or just survive, but I was tired of that. I needed to truly live and to feel alive!
Yet, I did not know what to do. My heart was slowly overtaking my mind and was loosing less and less reason to hold on to my life. Logic was not going to win and the black heart within was overtaking all aspects of my living. It was an argument that there was not anyway for my mind to win over a completely depressed heart.
A desperation within the heart and mind is a bad place be, and there are many ways to get there. It really does not matter how because in the end the thought is the same: there is no reason to continue on with life. Complete hopelessness. Complete despair. The end is within sight. What hope is there?
I believe a short look at the Apostle Judas Iscariot will do us some good. We need a reminder that God knows and understands us.
Judas was an extremely close associate of Jesus. They traveled together and worked and shared meals. I am fairly sure they shared tears and laughter throughout the three years of being together. Judas would have witnessed many great things and I cannot help but believe he would have stood in awe of what Jesus was doing. Yet, as we know he still ended up betraying Jesus.
Regret and remorse seem to have overtaken him. Trying to make things right with the religious leaders did him no good whatever. They rejected him and sent him away with no consolation or comfort for what had been done. Think about it: giving up some one you had spent the majority of your life with for a number of years, and then the people you helped in doing that act push you away as well. What would you have left to turn to?
Not only had he betrayed Jesus, but in the same action he had betrayed his other traveling friends. They would feel rejected by Judas. They would feel anger toward Judas, so how could he turn to them for any comfort or peace? They thought Jesus was going to set up a new kingdom on earth and now, he was dead, so at the moment their hopes were lost. Why would they want to have anything to do with him, or at least I can totally see him thinking that.
There was no Jesus to turn to. No way to physically ask for forgiveness, because there he was dying on the cross.
Completely alone. No community, no friends, no loved ones around. What was left for him? Where could he go? What could he do? We can easily say that he could have turned to God, but that is not so easy in a time of complete desperation. There needs to be community to help those people find their way. If I had lost all of my community I would not be here today. I would have not found a way to survive, because I had lost the battle of convincing myself there was a reason to stay alive.
We can live as Judas and loose all community, or we can learn from Judas and find ways to keep hold of community so that in our dark times we are not alone and are able to get the help we need to find brighter days. And those of us in the community need to watch out for those within our community to help others stay strong and not give up. I know that this will not stop all cases of suicide, but I believe it will help because it helped me.
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