Now that my TED talk is over, my journals from January are typed, and life has returned to it’s normal version of crazy busy, I guess this blog will morph into my mental/emotional/philosophical dumping ground….my new journal.

This morning as LeAnn and I were out for our 5am run, we got to talking about when life seems pointless, and you’d be content to end it all now and wave your white flag. Game over.

Life is hard and I think if we were able to be honest with each other, most of us at one point or another have felt this way. The problem is that sometimes we feel so hopeless and that life is so pointless that we take matters into our own hands and attempt or commit suicide.

In 2010, I had a 2 and 5 year old and because of mounded up life stressors, something in me snapped and I lost it. I remember driving down the road staring at my white knuckles on the steering wheel and watching the road with my peripheral vision, willing myself to not drive into a telephone pole and end it all. At the time, I was so overwhelmed, my subconscious mind saw death as the only way to find peace.

I loved my family and loved the Lord, but I couldn’t shake the hopelessness and brokenness I felt at the time. I very much understand how someone loved by many, with so much life to live, could unintentionally, intentionally take their own life. I have known at least 4 people who have ended their life at their own hands. I know 4 people who attempted and survived. I know 2 people who have held the barrel of a gun in their mouth, but couldn’t pull the trigger.

I know one who hung himself, and by divine intervention was strong enough to grab the toolbox he kicked away with the toe of his boot and loosen the noose before it was too late. He laid on the garage floor and cried himself to sleep. The only reason he couldn’t go through with it was because he feared facing God and explaining why he took the gift of life God gave him….even though at the time, it did not appear to be a gift at all.

I have several people in my life right now who are dealing with chronic conditions, just plain old age and even one with a terminal diagnosis. Not one of them fears death. They have all told me, they would welcome it. When so much of your capability is stripped away, and the independence and health you once knew is gone, it seems easy to conclude that our lives no longer hold value. After all, we don’t have the capacity to give or even connect in ways we used to.

There is a quiet part of me, a part that feels wrong to even express, but a very real part of me that has wrestled with the idea of assisted suicide with terminal patients. Not for reasons many say, like they cost our healthcare system so much money, but for compassionate reasons….when our pets are suffering and we conclude that the valuable part of their life is over, we euthanize them because it seems the compassionate thing to do. Why would that not be compassionate with people?

There are plenty of people who in their right minds would have likely signed a paper saying “when I no longer know my family because of alzhiemers, please help me end my life. Or when I am shaking so violently and unable to control any of my bodily functions, please help me end my life. Or if I am laying catatonic in a nursing home, please help me end my life.”

Many of them, the reason they are able to be there in that helpless state is because modern medicine kept them alive when they otherwise would have naturally died. Then when they deteriorate to that degree, it’s somehow wrong to help them die?

But we’re not even talking about these chronically ill patients, we’re talking about young people who are healthy, who feel like their life doesn’t hold value, or that they don’t have a place in the world, or that their homes have been wrecked by infidelity. We’re talking about difficult life circumstances leading people to feel hopeless.

As we were talking, I felt this fire welling up in my soul and made a Facebook live video. I said “if you have come to the end of yourself and you see no purpose in living, you see no value in who you are….it’s time to get on your knees and pray. Ask God why you’re here and what the purpose of this life is. He is waiting to answer.”

When we come to the end of ourselves and we have no reason to live….we have emptied out all of our vain attempts to find temporary happiness in the pursuit of money, status and belongings….we have the ability to truly surrender our lives and our wills to the plan God has for us.

I believe Jeremiah 29:11-13 which says “I know the plans I have for your declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call out to me and seek me and you will find me when you seek me with all your heart.”

I think that if there is still air filling your lungs, your purpose here on Earth is not over. God’s got plans for your life and you just need to seek Him and come into agreement with Him. Jesus said “in this world you WILL have troubles, but take heart, I have overcome the world.”