What do you do when you feel your world spiral out of control? Where everything you once knew has gone and you’re left in the rubble – the remains of what once was your everything. You search frantically, trying to find remnants of something, of good times passed. Those perfect moments slowly fading into oblivion, leaving you with the bitter taste of reality. Everything you once had, diminished to nothing. You had it all, but you threw it away in the name of love. Cliché?
You glance across the pillowing white sheets and hope that you could be swallowed and smothered in their cushiony comfort – your last breath being taken away gently and softly. No stress, no struggle.
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As a child your fears are instilled in you. You are taught to fear. Fear doesn’t come naturally; it’s not instinctual until a threat (which is too taught) is presented. The first threat we are taught; a treat to our health and happiness. As human beings we do anything and everything to avoid being hurt, thus fear is created.
No one can avoid being hurt, it’s impossible. However, the extent to which you can be hurt is within your control. Each person has their own defence mechanism, a mechanism that operates subconsciously and consciously. Some people’s better than other’s. Some explode in anger and heated rage. Some withdraw and let their pain swallow them whole. Some unfortunate few are caught in both extremes, leaving them unable to communicate their thoughts coherently.
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In a world as vast as ours, simple human emotions still orbit around one’s ability to sympathise and empathise with others. Without this ability you are deemed unable to connect with your fellow human peers. This inability renders you almost unhuman. As humans we seek individuals we can empathise with and gain sympathy from. If unable to gain sympathy when situations arise, one could go to the extreme of creating a situation where a feeling of warm sympathy wrapping its arms around you is achieved.
If this person happened to be one of the unfortunate few who is caught on the spectrum of extreme defence mechanisms and is too the same person who is unable to successfully obtain sympathy then problems begin to arise. This individual’s inability to communicate due to their thoughts being scattered and therefore speech is incoherent, creates problems when in dire need of sympathy. As this individual cannot request a need for sympathy more lucidly they begin to push those around them away so to victimise themselves in their mind and begin to sympathise with themselves. Since they cannot receive sympathy from others they must sympathise and empathise with themselves to fulfil that void where they are ignored.
If this destructive cycle continues, it chips away and eventually will consume this person whole. They would have pushed every person that was ever close to them away leaving them alone and in a pit of misery, where they once again begin to sympathise with themselves. Although this is not the most ideal method of dealing with situations, those trapped in this cycle find it difficult to free themselves from the destructive behaviour they exhibit.
So what does one do when their everything seems to be worth nothing?