HEART LINE
Death is not worth dying for

there could not be many of us who have not passed through it. i am talking about the stage when you genuinely, logically and practically decide that life is not really worth living. you tolerate a lot of horror, telling yourself that if it crosses the line of forbearance, you can choose the hard option of terminating the one-sided contract with him up there.i remember arundhati nag once saying to me during a heart to open heart talkathon, i'd always decided that if life ever gets too much, i'll simply put my hands into the electric socket, switch it on and go boom. however, when she lost her husband and life did get too much, she found it was not that simple. life requires courage, death more so. a psychiatrist was once asked, "at which point exactly does a person decide on suicide?" he said, when all hope is gone, when there appears not the slightest glimmer of the chance of a better tomorrow. i reached that stage once, more than a decade ago. it was a thought-out, completely sane decision, and after i made it, i paced the streets of mumbai where i then lived (mumbai is the kind of city where thoughts of suicide come cheap and easy) for nearly 3 hours, watching the rest of the unconcerned world, go callously about their own pursuits. i was going to walk into the inviting sea at bandra which had already claimed a plane-full of people one new years eve, and that was going to be that. except that on route i encountered a colleague and her husband and they talked me out of it. and that is why whenever i hear of a suicide victim, i wonder with much sadness, how did it happen, wasn't there anyone to talk the poor person out of it. as a society are we growing so careless, out-of-tune with one another and insensitive that some one near us is having suicidal thoughts and we cannot hear the desperate, silent screams for help? catherine marshall, one of the best writers of heart in the world, once said she believed that most people who commit suicide would not do so if they just waited for twenty-four hours. but it calls for a concerned environment to equip you with the power to put it off; to convey to you the surety that time heals and gives us a chance to put things into perspective. many do not get the chance. and then the media quickly jumps on the story when there is a suicide involved. cannot blame them, it is high drama. but what a tragic waste. for a worthless cause. death is certainly not worth dying for. bad enough, when it comes uninvited. it's a monstrosity when circumstances compel us to invite it. time for self-protection. we are in a society that can be best described as one of progressive deterioration. may of us spend our lives playing the "what if" game of torture. what if no one marries me? what if i lose my job? what if my children have an accident? what if my daughter goes astray? what if my son gets into drugs? what if i get cancer? our emotions rage; we are angry about the past, afraid for the future, and consumed with anxiety about today. the spiral continues when we let today's worry lead us to worse worry about tomorrow and the next day. many more are going to have suicidal thoughts knocking at the temple, families will think of suicide pacts and onlookers will continue to sigh with sadness. self-protection includes creating your own private high drama by making a life pact with someone instead of a death pact. if you know you are the vulnerable type and often feel so despondent that you consider putting your hand in the socket and going boom, find someone you trust and with whom you can be honest. tell the person what you have been contemplating and ask him or her to enter into a life pact with you that neither of you will take your own life without first talking to the other about it. find someone who will agree with you that life is worth living, then write your pact and sign it. your opening up may save the other person's life too.