“I’m done. I can’t take it any longer.” she said. “I’ve suffered from depression and anxiety since I was a teen, and I simply cannot do it any longer.” This call arrived many years into my tenure on the suicide hotline, so I was not surprised by its beginning. It was how the call ended …
On May 25, I was one of the presenters at PechaKucha Batavia. PechaKucha is a format in which you present 20 slides for 20 seconds each. I shared “Questions That Matter.” Unfortunately, the accompanying slides are unavailable, but here are my questions:
I have come to realize—even though I may wish otherwise—I will never grasp more than a sliver of reality. In a recent post, I noted how our view of reality is fragmented and distorted because we only absorb a small fraction of the infinite sensory inputs we experience at any moment. As a result, everything …
One of the most profound lessons I have extracted from nearly 20 years answering calls (11,000 or more) on the Suicide Prevention Lifeline is that each of us constructs an image—a tapestry—we truly believe represents reality, but turns out to be ambiguous, misleading, and very often wrong. Despite its extraordinary abilities, our brains are easily …
What if the answer was deeper, less objective and more nuanced than a simple recounting of the number of times the earth orbited the sun since the day you arrived? If I asked, instead, how creative you are, I would be confused and disheartened if you answered “5,” “23,” or “99.” Those are meaningless in …
“I would steal the stress and abuse from your life in an instant if I could, but I cannot. However, has the chaos you are facing taught you something about the human journey that you can use to help others?” I have asked some version of this question to hundreds of people over the past …
“I’m done. I can’t take it any longer.” she said. “I’ve suffered from depression and anxiety since I was a child and I simply cannot do it any longer.” I struggled to find words to help, and I told her so. In the midst of our conversation, she told me her psychologist believed every person …
At first, it ended tragically. At a recent Operation Snowball* retreat, the teens wrote a skit entitled “Asking for Help.” In the first performance, one of the teens was struggling mightily with challenges life mercilessly hurled in her path. Despite her overwhelming heartbreak and pain, she never asked for help. Those around her, even if …
If who I become in the world is determined by the decisions I make, the more I improve their accuracy and efficacy, the better I am as a person, physically and emotionally. The brain is a marvelous, complex organ, and, while we wish it would make every decision with perfection, it often lets us down. …
One Christmas afternoon many years ago, I answered a call on the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (1-800-273-TALK) from a young man in middle school. Through oceans of tears he told me how he and his father argued almost constantly. All he wanted to know was whether his father loved him. It broke my heart. We …