SUICIDE

Suicidal thoughts can make a person feel isolated

The Real Cause...

It can be very hard to understand why somebody would try to commit suicide, or actually commit suicide.

Over the last 20 years I have saved literally hundreds of lives from suicide. And I have found that the real cause is not what you might think.

The reason somebody tries to kill himself or herself is actually not because of something that has been done to them. It is because they have done something they wish they had not done. They are overwhelmed by the guilt of this. If somebody were to come along and really get in very good, kind and sincere communication with them, somebody whom they felt they could truly trust, and is that person could ask them kindly what it was that was troubling them, they would be then safely be able to confess what they had done. Instantly upon doing that, there would be every chance that they would feel better and the suicidal feelings would go. That is what I have found. And the hundreds of people – Mums, Dads and friends – that I have trained in my weekend workshops around the world, have also found the same thing.

This is the cause of suicide. Having committed a moral transgression, and feeling so bad about it that you want to get away from all the reminders of it, and the responsibility of it.

So the alarming suicide rate in China being currently reported, or in Japan or in Finland or in Scotland is due to a breakdown in the moral code of that society. Common scenarios of booze drinking, or taking drugs or being promiscuous can lead eventually to a trend of a higher suicide rate. In areas with heavy gambling, there is heavy suicide for example.

If we were to go out into the society, just you or I, and find people and talk to them and teach them about the importance of a moral code and the concept that all of us have made mistakes, all of us have strayed, but to do this is human. The answer is to clean it up. To talk to somebody you can trust and tell them what you have done – no matter how big or small – and then take responsibility.

1. The man who suddenly kills himself has a secret. There was something he was hiding, something he had done that he was very ashamed of.

2. The student who kills himself has a secret. He has done something that he would rather die than have found out.

3. The wife who kills herself, and then afterwards we find out, too late, that she was having an affair and could not bear the guilt of it. Rather than face being found out, she decided to end it all, as she just could not live with that guilt any longer.

Suicide is not caused by what others have done to you. It is what you have done to others that is the problem.

And so it goes on. Moral transgressions are common to all human beings and a part of life. But the trap of having them and not confessing them to the person you have harmed, and not cleaning up your act and getting yourself ethical has a heavy price. Sadness, or even suicide.

So if you know somebody who is sad and suicidal, offer to help him or her. Let them talk to you. Don’t pass judgment or give your opinion, just help them to clean it all up and take responsibility and quite simply you will have saved a life.

It’s not rocket science. It’s the truth. Get honest and straight and you will be happy.

I have saved literally hundreds and hundreds of lives from suicide by helping people to confront things that they have done that they feel bad about, and like magic, the terrible suicidal feelings go away.

Now depression – well that is another thing, quite different to suicide and I will write about that soon.

Grateful acknowledgement and thanks are given to all the wonderful philosophers from Aristotle to until today, whose names are too numerous to mention, whose works I have studied over the last 50 years that have contributed to and assisted my work on the understanding of human spirit.