Suicide

My life has been in a gradual state of decline since I graduated from High School, and there is no evidence of it stopping. Indeed, with the passing of my father, the decline has accelerated quite rapidly, and due to substantial financial difficulties, I don't foresee a deceleration in said decline anytime soon.

But hey, that's just me.

Finances are the one thing that really gets to me, everything else I can deal with.

Which is why I always go for the money. $$

Since nothing else is that big of a stressor for me.

edited 11th Jul '11 7:47:57 PM by Barkey

I have never been able to come even remotely close to being able to pay my own bills. Which is stupid because I have next to no expenses-I estimate I could probably get by on about 1000 a month-but since I've never been able to actually get employment (circumstances are complicated, to say the least), my expenses are irrelevant, because they're greater than zero.

Financial problems?

Tell me, Tomu, have you ever been dumpster diving? Oh, that was a lot fun when I had to do it.

And I'm a lot like Barkey and Mark over there, when life hit the gutter for me, it just made me push harder.

edited 11th Jul '11 9:41:37 PM by Ramus

The emotions of others can seem like such well guarded mysteries, people 8egin to 8elieve that's how their own emotions should 8e treated.

Ironically, food is the one thing that I'm not concerned about-food stamps are actually covering the food bills.

Look, everyone has their own minimum acceptable standard of living. Just because some guy is in Haiti is happy to live a life of abject poverty does not diminish the suffering of a person who is unhappy to live if they can't have a corvette (that's obviously both extremes of the end, but it's just an example).

Well, I suppose so, but I won't claim I was happy having to dumpster dive for a good several months (especially since I didn't qualify for food stamps, fuckers). That fight reflex that Mark and Barkey mentioned more or less defines me and I guess the only real difference between any of us in this topic is how optimistic or pessimistic one is feeling.

Maybe I'm an unusual story, but a bucket load of optimism, hard work, and little bit of luck managed to land me in a decent economic situation.

The emotions of others can seem like such well guarded mysteries, people 8egin to 8elieve that's how their own emotions should 8e treated.

Lucky you.

I've mostly had trouble with a combination of lack of connections to, well, anyone, generally inferior physical and social skills, an inability to drive, and of course lack of prior work experience.

Moving every year for the past six years doesn't help either, but I digress. And of course, with politics what they are, I can't imagine there being much of a Hope Spot anytime soon for anyone at this point. WOE AND DESPAIR!

But, everyone has their own Despair Event Horizon.

Understandable. For a while, I just basically lived outside of the local library and pretty much rode on getting enough scholarship money to get me to college, so I can't really say much for anything after that point.

edited 11th Jul '11 10:25:34 PM by Ramus

The emotions of others can seem like such well guarded mysteries, people 8egin to 8elieve that's how their own emotions should 8e treated.

I have a college degree and still can't get a job.

We've entered an era of financial instability where even Mc Donalds isn't hiring. It's difficult to think there's anything other than utter despair on the horizon.

Yeah.. I lived out of my car for a period of time while I was actually in the military, that really sucked.

I made the best of it, and actually kept it up for a few months once I had money because of how absolutely cheap it was to live like that.

Have you considered looking for jobs where they aren't expected to be? I mean, you've got places like The Escapist hiring, among a wide variety of other sites. There's also been a number of people who have successfully made a decent profit using their own site to bring in revenue.

I'll be the first to admit, I only knew about the Escapist thing because a friend told me, but seriously, take a look beyond your neighborhood. You even have sites now dedicated to helping people find jobs.

The emotions of others can seem like such well guarded mysteries, people 8egin to 8elieve that's how their own emotions should 8e treated.

No car no license. That actually disqualifies me from a massive number of different positions.

What the heck is The Escapist anyway? Pfft. Oh well, this thread isn't about my personal life, so I guess we should keep it on topic.

Likewise, I can't put myself into the mindset of someone with that kind of determination. I can somewhat model some of it on an intellectual level. I can rationalize "there is always hope", for instance, since technically, there always remains a possibility of something getting better, even if the probability is a billionth of a percent. But why would you keep persevering after the point of accepting that there's zero hope? In the absence of expectation of future reward, what's the payoff for the pain and effort you're spending? What purpose is served by butting your head against the wall?

The only thing I was able to think of that might fill that gap for someone is some sort of abstract principle, like an ideal or virtue, that allows them to trigger their reward center without actually achieving anything concrete; to feel good about themselves for living up to said principle. Granted, I can't relate to that mindset either. Or rather, I can't imagine the reward outweighing the suffering caused by perseverance.

Sure, but if the reasons for someone's suffering are things that fall outside of their locus of control, then the difference between a painful existence and a painful situation becomes academic. The feeling of being stuck with no way out but oblivion is the same. It's just that when it's a painful situation, one might still say there's a small probability of things getting better. But a tiny glimmer of hope isn't necessarily enough.

It's stubborness to be honest, I'm not really an optimistic person by any stretch. I never expect things to come out good, I just keep fighting. To be honest I start to get depressed if things start to go too flawlessly for too long, I have some strange intrinsic need for conflict. There's a common saying in my unit "If I ain't bitching, I ain't happy." and it holds true for me as well. If I have no ambitions, goals, or struggles, then I start to become depressed.

@Tomu: Well, I'd hate to say this because I hear it on TV Tropes all the time..

But did you get a shitty degree that isn't terribly practical? I see a lot of those majors on this site, believe me, I'm one of them.(Psych Major)

edited 12th Jul '11 12:10:40 AM by Barkey

As I've mentioned before, my degree is in the field of Economics.

Well I guess this is your first hand experience then.

<Glare>