Suicide lies. It tells you that the way you feel now is the way you will feel forever. Hope itself can seem like a toxic lie, a set-up for disappointment. The present feels permanent, and the future feels foretold.
Don’t fall for the lies. “The future,” as they say, “is unwritten.” Things can change. Things do change. Sure, there is no guarantee that things will get better. There also is no guarantee that things will get worse.
To resist the lies, visualize different selves that may emerge in the years to come. The psychologists Amy Wenzel and Shari Jager-Hyman call this exercise “future time imaging.” Imagine yourself in 1 year, 5 years, 10 years, and more. Imagine not only different times, but also different roles and situations that can happen in the years to come.
What work might you do?
Where might you live?
Will you have new work … goals … friends … talents … tattoos … travels?
The possibilities are limitless. Here are a few questions to get you started:
Imagine that you are able to get out of this suicidal crisis alive, even to feel a little better. What could your life look like a year from now?
In five years, what might your life be like? Where will you be living? What new things might you be doing?
In 10 years, who might you be? What new roles might you have taken on?
You may feel unable to look beyond the present. Or you may feel certain that what lies ahead is more of the same. If you have chronic illness or pain, for example, you might envision suffering in your future. In such cases, it can help to recall other times you have suffered, what you expected to happen then, and how you coped as time passed.
Even if the pain remains, your experience of suffering can change. This can happen many different ways. To name a few examples, you can practice mindfulness, engage in a spiritual practice, mobilize for larger causes, find (or make) meaning in your experiences, connect with others in similar situations, or do the things you yearn to do even while in pain.
The goal of this exercise is not to persuade you that everything will get better. Instead, the goal is to help you step outside the rigid tunnel vision that comes with suicidality.
You cannot know what the future holds.
Life can and will surprise you.
You do not have to fall for suicide’s lies.
Maybe, even, your future selves will be glad to be alive.
© Copyright 2017 Stacey Freedenthal, PhD, LCSW, All Rights Reserved. Written for www.speakingofsuicide.com. All photos purchased from Fotolia.com.
Not sure I *want* to adjust to going on indefinitely with the same health problems.
I don’t think this entry is particularly helpful. I do already sometimes imagine what might be possible, but my positive visions of my future depend on my recovering my health. It seems a lot more probable that things will simply become worse. I am in my fifties. I am not setting aside any money for retirement. I don’t make that much money and spend most of the surplus (if I can even call it that) on trying to deal with my health issues, or paying for certain conveniences that I might not otherwise pay for if I were healthier and had more energy. Aging is definitely making my situation worse, so I don’t see how that’s going to suddenly get better. Maybe if aging eventually kills off my desires, but that’s not much to look forward to.
I wish people would stop it with the excessive enthusiasm for mindfulness. My experiences with mindfulness types of meditation, and bringing mindfulness into everyday life, have mostly been negative. It made me feel alienated from my own experience. I also really dislike Buddhism’s answer to life’s problems. Of course eliminating desire or attachment to desire (whatever that really means, practically) can help reduce or eliminate suffering, but it seems fundamentally anti-life in is own way.
Seriously, our society has become so obsessed with mindfulness that it’s just downright pathetic. It’s too often used as a distraction from our problems that does nothing in the long run. And if it doesn’t work for you, people will get on your ass about it. Take this article for instance. https://positivepsychology.com/10-reasons-why-people-dont-meditate/#excuse-6 while some of the reasons listed are pretty unusual ones for not wanting to meditate or practice mindfulness (e.g. it’s selfish) others are completely valid like it’s too hard or it’s boring. The way the author tries to advertise their beloved mindfulness is just sad to watch. Or take Ronald Purser’s article “the mindfulness conspiracy” which explains how the practice has been exploited by capitalism. His article has been met with a slew of criticisms that are nothing more than ardent mindfulness fanatics losing it because their practice is getting the scrutiny it deserves. I’ve had to do mindfulness while in ABA therapy, sometimes because the therapist wanted to, rather than because I wanted to which disregards my needs. I explained to her that it does not work for me and she kept insisting that it does and that I’m not just doing it right. How rude of her!
This article may well be good advice for a young and otherwise healthy person, but I wouldn’t dare ask these questions of my wife, who has Huntington’s Disease, is understandably depressed, and has ideated suicide several times and tried once. For her, the answers are as follows:
1 year: Continuing cognitive and physical decline taking away more activities that were once enjoyed. Ongoing changes in personality along with worsening mental health issues.
5 Year: Probably will need a full-time caregiver to assist with daily living tasks.
10 Year: Complete inability to communicate and total disability necessitating 24 hour nursing care.
She already knows these answers. That’s why she’s in the mental state she’s in. Thus, I’d be a fool to ask the questions. Every depressed/suicidal person is different. Be careful about what advice you take.
Norb,
Your points are well taken (if belatedly, on my end). I’m sorry about your wife’s physical and mental pain.
Thanks, it actually helped.
Good to know! Thanks for sharing. Please also check out the Resources page for places you can get help by phone, text, email, or online chat, if needed.
In the shadow I ask why? In my dreams, “freeze frame” that moment at the beach, when the wind catches your copper sunset hair as you turn, smile and laugh. My breath caught still by you .My time, It’s mine. I tell you I love you and you hear me. Everything ordinary and extraordinary every moment we had togetherness you and me. I know you chose this, What did I miss? What did I fail to see. My breath is caught.
Anonymous,
You vividly and beautifully capture the pain of many people who lost someone they love to suicide. “What did I miss? What did I fail to see?” Such painful questions. Thank you for sharing.