When Ashit, Saransh and I discussed on starting our own blog site, one thing that we were sure of was that the content would vary from technology to business to general (prevalent and relevant) topics. While I had already written my first blog on marketing and about to publish it, I was already thinking of writing something on a topic that would be relevant to this lockdown situation and the news of sad demise of actor Sushant Singh Rajput was all over the media. That piece of news left me with a lot of thoughts on why someone would take this extreme step to end the journey that seemed to have hit the correct road. Yet again, “depression” was identified as the reason. People, both from within and outside the Hindi film industry started sharing their reactions and out pours of sympathy towards not only the deceased actor but towards people in general as well who are battling depression. There have been a steady rise in the no. of depression related deaths, 8,00,000 people every year die by committing suicide. (source: WHO) The scenario is worse with regards to our own country where mental illness is not even considered as an illness. Before I put anything forward, I want you to keep in mind that suicide is the second leading cause of death in 15-29 years. (source: WHO) I am not going to present any advice or suggestions as I am not qualified to be doing that but as debate or being an observant, am putting forward some points that I feel should be looked into.
Why would someone as young as 15 or as youthful as 29 think of committing suicide ? Probably, personal situations which may include family related issues, relationship issues, feeling of self-worthlessness or professional issues which may range from joblessness to overworked or a combination of both. Ending of life in this way is the most tragic form be it for any age group but when you look at 15 years old and 29 years old struggling to get past life, you can’t help but wonder this is the age that has maximum energy levels, most enthusiastic years, full of ideas and LIFE and DREAMS. Dreams, yes, that’s the word. When you dream of something and give your all to achieve it, be it saving your falling relationship or your family drifting apart or you not getting your due for the efforts put in your professional life, that feeling puts you in a state from where one cannot see any escape and it’s because they held something so dearly or wanted something badly and ended up exhausting every ounce of energy to protect it or achieve it and couldn’t.
The way our society works is that failures aren’t looked upon as steppingstones anymore but as a lost last opportunity as if there will be no more opportunities coming our way. And this shapes the way people start seeing themselves, through the lens that has failure written all over it and mind you, money, name, fame cannot guarantee you happiness as it’s subjective. I’ve met orphan children on streets being happy celebrating a festival and then people living in sprawling bungalows wanting to end their meaningless life. So when happiness is subjective, are failures any different? What might not be seen as a failure by you may be a big deal for someone going through it, especially for the young people who dreams and work for larger than life status and when this scenarios shatter in front of them, even the failure seems worse than the worst. Understanding that these situations cannot be managed by family and friends alone and a professional help must be sought. When a person reaches a point where he sees no escape, it becomes of utmost importance to understand the psyche of the person and that job should be done by a professional as you might not know which cords not to touch.
People say a lot on what the depressed should do, not thinking that they have reached a stage where they don’t have control over their own thoughts. Thus, people around them have to understand what they need to do and remember that professionals make people see the light at the end of the tunnel but family and friends help to walk the way. Creating an atmosphere where even your failures are celebrated because you put in efforts, because you didn’t give up, where rat-race is left for the rats and we start being humans first and last, this might seem a distant dream…..but I’m not giving up on it, as yet.
You want to see a change around, let’s begin by being one
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi