Is life worth living?

[Lark]

I agree with this. Consumerism is a great source of contamination for the human mind. There are many sad things in the world, and as someone with depression I know all too well the sinking deadening feeling of pointlessness, but there are also many wonderful things that make it worth living I've grown to appreciate.

I think that a certain sort of consumerism is innate to human beings and is fine but commercial interest ramp it up and make it chronic. This can be awful if you have means and a measure of insight about it. Although there's a great mass of people who dont and they're really vulnerable to the messages and manipulation of the same trends. They get consequences themselves and so does everyone else because no one really suffers in splendid isolation.

This isnt a criticism of capitalism per se as I think socialists, communists, fascists, pretty much any ideology, has in some way promised people something in the same order of things or of a similar trend, there's no disagreement about the goal of seeking more and more, just the essential means to that end.

 

[SirCanSir]

I also think consider thoughts about life not being worth living and any thoughts about self-harm resulting in a premature death, which could be suicide or misadventure, is usually a permanent solution applied to a temporary problem.

There's usually a lot of situational stressors which seem insurmountable, although whether there is or whether there apparently is not, the mood and mental state that anyone is experiencing, whether its triggered by stressors or totally endogenous, is not fixed. It can change. Sometimes spontaneously, sometimes with good fortune, sometimes with time limited treatment.

So imagining that life is not worth living is often too quick to become "life is always not worth living" instead of "life seems like it is not worth living right now".

In the Matrix when the computers tell Neo that designing a utopian version of the Matrix without misery or difficulty of any kind resulted in humans becoming psychotic or dying I think they had a point. Plus I think there's avoidable and unavoidable suffering in life, both can test you but you can choose to prepare for the unavoidable sort and plan ahead when dealing with it to manage or reduce it while just avoiding the avoidable sort altogether.

I understand there are cases which is really hard for some people to snap out of the mindset that "Life is never going to be good", and often enough its related to depression and mental disorders that make them constantly suffer or atleast forget the better times due to the intensity of the emotions they experience during that suffering. There are also external problems we can face that have too devastating consequences which can break someone's will.

But even in cases like this the answer to give up can still be too quick. Sometimes things just get better. For mentally ill people that fortune as you described it can come in the form of medication and therapy. For others it can come in the form of closeness and assistance from people that care... and more often than not even at our lowest points, even when we arent fortunate/lucky and we are cornered, as long as we keep striving for finding new options and answers to escape the situation, there is a strong chance we will.

Clinging to life and survival is the answer. It propels us forward when there is nothing left. And if we survive it makes us stronger in the end.