Hold their hands before it’s late.
Never too late by three days grace, Why by Rascal Flatts
“Even if I say, it’ll be alright, Still I hear you say, you want to end your life, Now and again, we try, to just stay alive, maybe we’ll turn it all around, ‘Cause it’s not too late, It’s never too late.” The lyrics to this song, ‘never too late’ by three days grace is a reminder that we have the chance to save our beloved. If we stopped to listen, we could hold their hands and show them the beauty of life that might not be clear to them. If we cared a little more than on the surface, we could help them stop existing and live their life’s purpose. However, this is easier said than done. Reason being that we don’t really understand the battles they are fighting. The struggles that they have had to endure to come to only one conclusion that they cannot take back. The decision to end it all. The lack of hope for the sun to rise. The dead ends of every possible path they would consider. Maybe if we knew what is in their minds we would understand.
Have you ever felt so broken that you just wanted to bang your head on the wall? Have you ever been so lost that you intentionally walked bare foot on broken glass? Have you ever wished for the end of your misery that you tried to drown yourself in a bucket of water? Has the darkness ever been so captivating that you never wanted the sun to rise on a new day? Have you ever lost the will to live that you wanted the ground to open up and swallow you? Have you ever started walking and did not know where you were going?
I don’t know if there is a lesson about life other than experience. We do not seem to appreciate the best experiences of our lives and just take it at face value. On the other hand, adverse experiences of life seem to throw us off balance. We are never prepared for the negativities. We somehow have the notion that life is a bed of roses. Well, roses have thorns.
People with thoughts of suicide feel lost. Most of the time their only companion is their thoughts. It is okay to wonder about life. The purpose of it all and how or why we came to be. Why we struggle to live yet in the end we all die. Why we have to do everything to fill our place in the society. I wonder about that each waking day. However, our thoughts mislead us. Voices in our head may tell us how much we are not good enough. Our thoughts never fail to remind us of our past transgressions. Trust your thoughts to condemn you to a life of misery. Reminding you of how you have always failed, so what is even the purpose of still trying? It is hard to keep these negativities off you.
Have you ever felt the world crashing down around you? Have your walls ever felt like a house of cards? Have you ever felt like dying is the only solution to save yourself and save the disappointment that you are bound to give your loved ones? Have you ever felt that you are not enough for the society? That you do not deserve the love that you are receiving from your loved ones, that you would save them a heartache when you leave?
If you ask me the meaning of life, I would tell you that I don’t know. There was a time in my life that I thought success was life’s purpose. That fulfilling the societal expectations of success would make me happy. That if I was able to have tons of money, I would be happy. Until life happened. I had time to think over things and realized that my dreams were baseless. For a long time, I used to ask myself and people around me if life was really one straight line. Birth-education-job-marriage-kids-death. I did not like the idea of it but I worked towards this path because that was what was clear. For some reason I had to fall to discover what I really wanted. To be happy. To enjoy the moments that made me smile. To love and be loved. To enjoy art, music and spend time with the people I love. It is human nature to want other people in our lives and that is something I will not throw away.
Suicide comes with a lot of regret on our part. Mostly because we had no idea what people were going through. It is clear from the lyrics to the song Why by Rascal Flatts. We regret that we did not know if we had the chance to help. And mostly that we never saw it coming. That we were too blind to see the pain in their eyes. That they had lost hope. We regret that we claimed to love them yet they did not trust us to hold them and remind them of the beauty of life.
For many people, suicide comes as a shock. They will say. “But she looked okay”, “we were together yesterday and he was laughing”. But do we know what happens when the music stops? Are we aware of the pain that lingers when the door closes behind them? When did opening up to each other become a weakness? Why would we wait till they are gone to give them praise? Let us hold each other’s hands. Let us enjoy life together. It is something that we do not understand. Let death be a celebration of life rather than pain lingering in the air. Let us not get to the point of asking ourselves why they had to leave by their own hands. Let us hold their hands before it’s late.