Summary

The author shares a personal journey from suicidal ideation to finding love for life, emphasizing the importance of perseverance and hope.

Abstract

The article "How To Fall In Love With Life" is a poignant reflection on the author's transformation from a place of deep despair to a profound appreciation for life. It recounts the author's experiences with mental health crises, hospitalization, and the contemplation of suicide. Through a series of personal anecdotes spanning several years, the author illustrates the evolution of their mindset—from feeling trapped and unwilling to live, to a realization of life's preciousness, particularly in the wake of a loved one's passing. The narrative underscores the message that life can and does get better for those who choose to stay, despite the challenges and setbacks that may feel as Sisyphean tasks. The author encourages readers who may be struggling to hold on, as hope and gratitude can eventually replace despair, and the journey through hardship can lead to a profound love for life.

Opinions

The author believes that the societal focus on negative news can overshadow the positive aspects of life, making it seem radical to express love for life.
They convey that individuals who contemplate suicide are not driven by hatred for life but by a desire to love it that they feel unable to fulfill.
The author suggests that the pain of life is temporary and that enduring through the darkness can lead to better days.
They emphasize the importance of staying alive, as giving up may prevent one from experiencing the joy and gratitude that can come with perseverance.
The author shares a personal revelation that life's beauty can become so profound that it brings tears, contrasting with the tears shed over the unwillingness to live in the past.
They remind readers that change is possible and that one's current struggles may eventually be looked back upon with pride for having overcome them.
The author encourages those struggling to find reasons to stay, reinforcing the message that things can and will get better with time and resilience.

How To Fall In Love With Life.

When people say that ‘things get better’, they really do. Please give life a chance to prove that to you.

I have something radical* to say.

Writing this with tears in my eyes as I reflect on how far I have come**

‘I love life.’

* ‘Radical’ because when the bad news outsells the good on a mass scale, we are reminded of all that’s ‘bad’ in the world every single day, to the extent that it becomes more radical of a thing to say that we’re not suicidal in the face of it all than to say that we ‘love life.’

** ‘As I reflect on how far I have come’ because it’s not always been this way…

Five years ago

I was in the hospital, being sat down by a psychiatric nurse, and talked through the irreversibility of suicide. ‘A permanent solution to a temporary problem.’ Being told about the slow and painful death that often comes with an overdose after they had discovered my phone’s search history, realised my intentions.

‘People think that it will be quick but in most cases, it isn’t.’

Being held while I cried and cried (and cried) about how messy my head felt/my unwillingness to be alive, and their unwillingness to let me take my own life:

trapped.

Three years ago

I relapsed. Texting my sister in the middle of the night, ‘I just feel sad. all the time. If I wasn’t here, people would get over it eventually, life goes on. People move on.’

Wanting to move on, not feeling like I belonged here, in this world anymore.

Writing a note, preparing to go

(just let me go).

One year ago

I held my grandad’s hand while he was dying and it struck me, for the first time in my life, how precious life really is. How people who commit suicide don’t commit suicide because they ‘hate’ life, but because they want to love life, but just…

can’t.

Clinging onto hope until the hope is gone and they can’t hold on and they have to let go and they go…

But, who’s to say that if they hadn’t let go, then they wouldn’t be waking up tomorrow, hope returned, echoing the sentiments that I am writing today;

‘Life gets better but you have to stay.’

Please give life a chance to prove that to you.

Three Years Ago I Wanted To Die VS 3 Years On: I Am In Love With Life. … How Things Change.

Life gets better but you have to stay.

https://theaestheticist.com/how-to-push-a-boulder-up-a-hill/

Even when some days you feel like Sisyphus, condemned for all eternity to push a boulder up a mountain, only to have it roll to the bottom (again and again), your head screaming at you to give up;

‘let go, too heavy, too weak’,

when the temptation to collapse into a sobbing heap over the injustice of it all, to let the boulder crush you is strong,

stay.

Let the injustices of the world fuel you to keep getting up, to keep pushing and pushing and pushing, hoping, however delusional it may seem that one day, you will reach the top, looking down at the hell you’ve been through to get there with gratitude that;

‘Here you are (here I am) alive, despite it all.’

A reminder* that things can (and will) get better one day, but only if you stay.

(Please stay).

*& a reminder, for myself, of a meme I saw on TikTok the other day:

‘Stop asking me if my 16-year-old self would be proud. I’m not trying to impress a mentally ill child.’

* mic drop*

I felt that.

But she would, you know? She would be proud.

She’d be proud of me turning 23 this year, an age that she couldn’t even let herself think about, the prospect of staying for another six years:

terrifying.

She’d be proud of the transition in those six years.

To go from crying over my unwillingness to be alive to crying over the beauty of life.

How things change.