It is probably obvious that I think you have something to look forward to because I wouldn’t be creating this course if I didn’t have faith in your ability to overcome, recover, and grow.
All of the possible paths forward can start from this one thing:
Believe that there is at least a small chance that you can have a positive future.
No therapy or medicine or guru or manual can help you if you don’t first believe that a positive future is possible. In my opinion, you don’t need cheery and optimistic assurance that things will get better.
This is just an honest and realistic perspective, it is possible for things to get better… and possible is enough reason to try.
“A thought, even a possibility, can shatter and transform us.”
– Friedrich Nietzsche
I set up this virtual interview based on an exercise that I use on myself when things look dark and hopeless.
I hope you’ll try it out.
“In this moment, there is plenty of time. In this moment, you are precisely as you should be.
In this moment, there is infinite possibility.”
– Victoria Moran
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Experience
It is my experience that pain is bearable when you know it’s going to stop. Total hopelessness is the belief that there is absolutely 0% chance of things getting better, and it is the most dangerous belief I know. If I’m able to crack that just a little bit, then everything else enters the round with possibilities. I can see the world is a very dark place sometimes, but not absolute and complete darkness without even a speck of light.
Research
Both the early theory such as Shneidman on constriction, and recent research on suicidal thinking have highlighted entrapment as a major factor. This is the perception that there is absolutely no alternative, and it makes death more appealing. On the opposite side of this, there are buffers against suicide that include concepts like planning for the future. In this all becomes consistent with the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline Imminent Risk Policy and allowing for the presence of reasons for dying and a negative perception of the future in general, but reframing it in terms of the positive side, focusing on that even if it is weak at the moment. We want to be on the life-affirming side of any ambivalence about suicide.