Why do people equalize having no meaning in life with committing suicide?

[noname223]

Today I have read a text of someone who said DFW has not seen meaning in his life otherwise he would not have ctb. I am not fully in favor of this idea or concept of seeing no meaning in life in relation to suicide.

Another better example (when we consider the opposite statement): I think many people live their life without seeing a meaning in life. I think if you ask some average people on the street most answers won't be very intricate. I think there are a lot of people out there who think life has no meaning and these people don't commit suicide. If you are not suffering a lot many don't question being alive. Some find life boring with the same daily routines. (damn I envy this feeling. I worry so much everyday I just wished I had the same reassurance in my abilities as many neurotypicals. I am facing really existential sorrows and problems. Most people don't experience them as intensively and over a long time like me.)

I think you don't really need a meaning in life in order to stay alive. Especially if you are not suffering a lot many don't mind that. This is at least my personal opinion.

To DFW. I think some people even commit suicide despite the fact they see meaning in life. Maybe it is important to differentiate between meaning of your specific life or in a general sense about life. But for me I don't think that this must necessarily be an opposition. When my pain was unbearable the suffering was just overwhelming. I suffered extremely. Like I saw in some way meaning in my life because I have good friends who support me a lot. And I knew that there is the potential that things can improve. I knew this severe psychosomatic pain would likely not last forever. But it was on a pain scale such extreme that I had the feeling I had to ctb back then no matter what. I absolutely could not cope with this insane pain. I did not really care about whether my life had meaning or not. I just had the urge to exit this extreme torture.
My time in the psychiatry at least alleviated the urge of acting on this extreme acute suicidality a little bit.

What are your thoughts on that? Maybe it depends on how we define these terms.
I could be wrong with these considerations.

 

[Fadeawaaaay]

Well, some people, including myself, don't see any need to live because we don't have any meaning… We have no purpose… There's no reason for us to be here… Some people might have more pressing reasons to end their life… Severe mental illness… Chronic and excruciating pain…

 

[lostmylove]

Life has meaning in my opinion, it's based around love. When you're neglected or you lose your love that's where the pain starts.

I will kill my self. But I don't see a contradiction in saying that life has a meaning.

My overriding feeling is sadness that things are never going to get better, and that I'm condemned to death with my partner passing away.

I would of give anything to of grown old happy with him, if that's meaningless in some peoples eyes I don't agree

 

[Fadeawaaaay]

Life has meaning in my opinion, it's based around love. When you're neglected or you lose your love that's where the pain starts.

I will kill my self. But I don't see a contradiction in saying that life has a meaning.

My overriding feeling is sadness that things are never going to get better, and that I'm condemned to death with my partner passing away.

I would of give anything to of grown old happy with him, if that's meaningless in some peoples eyes I don't agree

All this started with a bad break up for me… It's actually my birthday today and my ex girlfriend sent me a message wishing me a happy birthday… She ditched me about a year ago… All this seems like a bad dream

 

[Lost Magic]

Yes, it is a complicated thing, to not want to exist anymore. I mean we are biologically adapted to survive and keep going at all costs. I do believe, however, hope is a big factor in wanting to live a meaningful life. When hope dies we cease to see magic in the world. There is a big difference between just getting through life and truly living life. I also believe that luck has a lot to do with it. You hear a lot of, humble, celebrities say that they just got lucky. It's just unfortunate that we didn't all inherit the luck and good fortune that some people did. But I guess luck runs out, eventually as well. Luck and time. We are all just passing through life, waiting to die. None of us get out alive anyway. Be as well as to just accept the inevitable and live each day the best we can manage until that day comes. And for me, that day can't come quick enough.

 

[lostmylove]

All this started with a bad break up for me… It's actually my birthday today and my ex girlfriend sent me a message wishing me a happy birthday… She ditched me about a year ago… All this seems like a bad dream

Am sorry to hear that. My partner died last week, I'm on verge of nervous breakdown right now

 

[Notemia]

No meaning isn't strictly tied to suicide, I think it's mostly just practically speaking mentally damaging more often than not. Not sure about this, but I think most people don't think about the big picture or long into the future because they are stuck in a cycle of always having to worry about the next imminent issue/obligation in their lives. This is doubly true because most people in the world live in very bad conditions with little resources, but we are biased because you mostly see/talk to people in developed or at least medium tier countries on the internet. It's also important to differentiate between objective and subjective meaning. Most of the time here I see people talking about subjective meaning, but there is no objective meaning. It's almost certain, the only refutation to that is religion or a religion equivalent idea. There's nothing wrong with subjective meaning, but it's a vague thing which you can define to be anything, so it doesn't really matter. How I see it is that from the moment the universe ends, that state is equivalent to nothing ever having existed in the first place.

 

[davidgeorge]

Should people considering suicide study Philosophy? This thread makes me think considering the meaning of life may not help some people.

 

[noname223]

Should people considering suicide study Philosophy? This thread makes me think considering the meaning of life may not help some people.

I still think that having meaning in life can give you strength to carry on with life. Personally I try to find meaning in life. For example some ethical principles. I try to find some meaning in or at least despite my suffering. Don't get me wrong. I think it really can help.

But I think seeing meaning in life does not necessarily prevent a suicide. At least this was my personal experience with it.

Concerning philosophy. I think it can give you strength but for some people it might be also depressing. Especially if people are too obsessed with pessimism and nihilism. My personal experience was that these two philosophies increased my pain. Since then I try to stay away from them.

 

[Hurt]

This is my way of thinking: I think we all come here to experience this world and try to survive until we die. When someone doesn't enjoy being in this world that's when suicidal thoughts come. Some people can achieve great things in life and some people not. I belong to people who don't have great aspirations and only try to stay and live for the day. I hate myself when I see other people progressing in life because I can't. I'm trapped in this constant bad state of mind and it's hard to get out of here. Anyway I wish u all try to stay and enjoy as much as you can although I know for sompe people life is torture. I'm so sorry.

 

[FuneralCry]

I believe that often when many people realise how meaningless life is, they see no point to suffering and this makes them want to ctb. They do not see their lives as being worth living. I think that it is the truth, that life is just a pointless experience that we go through for the sake of it, there is no point to living. The idea that life has any meaning is just a delusion.