why do you think that we can't go on pretending forever?
Answers
Explanation:
So much of the message of the book of Ecclesiastes is “the Preacher” (Ecclesiastes 1:1) helping us to let the reality of our death sink into our bones and lodge itself deep in our hearts. But that’s because he’s writing a book about what it means to live. He wants the consequences of our fast-approaching disappearance from the earth to work their way out into all the realities of the way we see the world and the way we view ourselves within that world. The single question that animates him is this: If we won’t live forever, or even long enough to make a lasting difference to the world, how then should we live?
ive gone my whole life believing that I was perfectly fine. I flat out denied the possibility that I couldn’t do everything on my own. From an early age, I strove to be independent (as much as I could) and rarely “sunk” to the level of letting people in. This complex carried itself over into the status of my mental health. I look happy. I smile a lot, so I must be okay. Right?
At the age of 8, I had my first panic attack. My grandmother was babysitting me as my mom was staying in a hospital a few towns over. I just found out she was sick. I didn’t fully understand it, so I didn’t think much about it. But I did notice that things were changing. One night, as everything seemed perfectly normal, a weight the size of a truck collapsed onto my consciousness and I lost every sensible aspect of myself and I screamed. I screamed and screamed until my throat was raw, and my poor grandmother was beside herself, feeling nothing but helpless. Eventually, I just blamed the attack on the situation and my young age. It couldn’t be a recurring problem. I didn’t talk about that moment again for a long time.
As I got older, I started to notice myself change. I started to get irritable. I was snappy to my parents and my friends, and it carried over into my adult life and my relationship. I started to get sad about things that didn’t warrant sadness. I stopped having reasons for my tears, but I let them fall anyway. I blamed it on stress. I was fine.
Depression doesn’t always just hit you. It slowly works its way into your being without you noticing, feeding on your insecurities and your weaknesses until you no longer feel like yourself anymore. It starts with an attitude. A mood swing. A negative thought here and there. Eventually you find it harder and harder to get out of bed. You start to lose touch with the reasons you do the things that you do. And before you know it, you come home from class or work or whatever and spend the rest of your night lying in bed wondering how the hell you got like this. But you still get up and do the things you have to do, because you keep convincing yourself and everyone around you that you’re happy. You don’t need anyone’s help. You’re fine.