Livestrong.com - Dealing with Suicide
What irrational thinking leads you to consider or to commit suicide?
How can you overcome hopelessness which leads to suicidal ideation?
In order to overcome a sense of hopelessness, you need to:
What irrational thinking leads you to consider or to commit suicide?
- There is too much for me to change in my life for me to become happy.
- I am too overwhelmed by all of my problems and I can see no way out.
- No one really cares about me anyway so no one will miss me when I'm gone.
- I'll show them for rejecting, ignoring and not wanting me.
- No matter how hard I try, I never seem to succeed.
- Everybody hates me, nobody likes me so I'm going to end it all.
- I can't face this mess I've made.
- I could never face others if they ever found out the truth about me.
- My whole life has been full of pain and hurt and I'm tired of hurting so much.
- People won't blame me for solving their problem which seems to be me.
- My life has no meaning, no value, no purpose, no direction and no sense, so why go on?
- Everyone has abandoned me, including God.
- I'm so unhappy, what's the use?
- I am so angry and upset that I'd rather die than go on to work it out.
- I'll teach them for treating me this way.
- No one has ever loved me, approved of me or accepted me, so why go on?
- I'm only a "shell'' of a person with nothing left to give others.
- I'm in too much pain and agony to go on.
- I'd rather die than face the future.
- I'd rather quit than go on.
- Every attempt I make to get out of this hole ends in failure for me so why continue trying?
- There's no way I'll ever be happy in this lifetime.
- Suicide is an act of courage and it takes great strength to do it
- I see no reason for continuing to live.
- They'll be sorry when I'm gone.
- I hate all of them so much that this will show them and put them in their place.
- The rejection I feel right now is so painful that unless that person comes back into my life I am going to end it.
- I feel so hopeless and see no way out of it.
How can you overcome hopelessness which leads to suicidal ideation?
In order to overcome a sense of hopelessness, you need to:
- First: Reach out to others for support to help you follow through on the rest of these steps.
- Second: Identify what you feel hopeless about.
- Third: You then need to identify what distorted, irrational or unhealthy thinking is at the root of what is making you feel hopeless.
- Fourth: Then you need to develop new healthier, more rational ways of thinking about these things.
- Fifth: You then need to identify what distorted, irrational or unhealthy feelings are blocking your acceptance of these new healthier, more rational beliefs and keeping you from being more hopeful.
- Sixth: You need to emotionally release all of your blocking feelings through anger workout, despair, letting-go exercises and inner child healing work.
- Seventh: Once you have vented anger, cried out your despair and opened your inner self to experience feelings more freely, you then need to make a place in your life for a Higher Power. This is the God of your belief system. You need to turn to your Higher Power and seek strength, wisdom and light from your belief. This is the power greater than you to whom you can turn over your unchangeables and uncontrollables. This Higher Power can give you the patience, calmness and strength to accept reality as it is today for you.
- Eighth: Once you begin to allow yourself to rely on your Higher Power for the strength to "let go'' of your pain, hurt, depression, anger, despair, sense of abandonment, sense of being overwhelmed and alone, then you need to begin to take control of your actions and behaviors and start all over again to attempt to find a sense and order in your life which gives you meaning and a hope to continue on in life.
- Ninth: You then need as you "go on'' to focus efforts on breaking down your current problems into smaller workable components which have a greater probability of immediate success. Some examples of success breeders are:
- Live one day at a time without focusing on the overwhelming prospects of the future.
- Enjoy your "gift of life'' each day and without taking it for granted, since you don't know the day or time when indeed you will die.
- Use self-affirmations of your value and worth and work at "falling in love'' with yourself on a daily basis.
- Refocus on yourself as the major source of help to get you out of your current pain rather than looking for others' help to rescue or to fix you.
- Empower yourself with the belief that there is nothing you can't overcome here on earth with the help and assistance of your Higher Power.
- Recognize that, no matter how great the physical, emotional or psychic pain you are going through right now, there is an end to it down the road as long as you continue to work at honestly accepting the reality of life as it really is rather than how you want it to be.
- Recognize that rather than solving all of your problems at once you can make greater progress by solving each problem one at a time at a slow and steady pace. Since it took a lifetime to get you here, it will take the rest of your life to get you out.
- Allow yourself to be human and open yourself to accept any further failures, mistakes or slow progress in your efforts to solve your problems.
- Accept that "relapse'' is a fact of life in recovery and do not get down on yourself if you should experience any reversal or set back.
- Commit yourself not to quit as you proceed in your efforts to turn your life around.
- Live one day at a time without focusing on the overwhelming prospects of the future.
- Tenth: As you become more "hopeful'' about yourself and your prospects of "going on,'' reward yourself for your progress and recognize the "success'' you have achieved to that point. It is important for you to recognize your growth and to enjoy the benefits that come with it. Remember success breeds success so reinforce yourself for each incremental step to overcoming hopelessness and in so doing you will become more hopeful on a daily basis.
- Eleventh: Recognize as you increase in hopefulness that control for your life rests in you and your relationship with your Higher Power so don't neglect yourself or your Higher Power and take time to relax and have fun as well as give time to your Higher Power through prayer and meditation.
- Twelfth: If you should fall prey to a period of hopelessness again, return to Step 1 and begin again.
