The Desire to Have Never Been Born 

We having an existential crisis with this one

Thanks for not accepting the better help sponsorship 🙌🏽

"And I declared that the dead, who had already died, are happier than the living, who are still alive. But better than both is the one who has never been born, who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun." - Ecclesiastes 4:2-3

I will always remember being in a psych ward and talking to one of the other girls. She said that we weren’t selfish for wanting to kill ourselves, but that others were selfish for wanting to keep us alive when it was so painful. The suffering may have already happened but to imagine a life where it repeats forever is a difficult thing. Now I don’t struggle nearly as much but I think I’ll always agree with her on some level.

My personal experience with suicidal ideation was that I truly, don't want to be here. I don't want to deal with everything life throws my way (the happy AND the sad). It's tiring. It just feels logical, like, if I was experiencing burnout I would be recommended to leave my job. If I was experiencing a toxic relationship i would be recommended to leave...what do I do if I'm just tired, overall? But yeah, I'm too tired to even try, and deal with whatever the consequences of attempting will bring, so I guess I'm staying

In the words of Doug Stanhope "Everybody that says that suicide is not the answer, hasn't heard all the questions." Not all suicidal thoughts come from feelings of hopelessness.

“Even as a child, when I lacked for nothing, I wanted to die: I wanted to surrender because I saw no sense in struggling. I felt that nothing would be proved, substantiated, added, or subtracted by continuing an existence I never asked for.” I remember having so many arguments with my parents as a child because I would say “I wish I was never born!” and they’d inevitably call me dramatic. It’s a thought I’ve never been able to shake and the older I get the more justified I feel my child self was.

being su*cidal, for me, outside of abuse/mistreatment, is this ever-existing exhaustion that life requires. Growing up I never had a goal, I didn't have a dream job, I didn't know you could have those things. Yes I knew what the word literally meant, but I didn't understand why 'goals' were being poised as so important. I just existed on, taking steps in an attempt to mirror what my classmates were doing in an attempt to be like them and maybe achieve friends. I applied to college, picked a random major, and even now as an adult I feel like I'm just doing what I have to do with no clear goal. It's exhausting. Even thinking of the concept of a goal and creating one seems exhausting in the ever-changing world dynamics of political turmoil, climate change, and all existential worries. I can't separate and compartmentalize things I think other people easily do. Even if I was able to actually conceptualize a goal, I don't think I deserve the happiness of succeeding it. When I do rarely feel happy, there's an underlying sense of doom and dread from beneath that prevents me from feeling it completely. I wouldn't say my life is miserable, and I do have a momentary reason to keep on living: academic validation. I'm currently knee deep in extracurriculars and major-centered programs in an attempt for validation from professors and staff I admire, meanwhile I have no clear want to actually be doing these things and rather than learning it feels like an obligation not to let them down. But it's all so exhausting. The chase for academic validation being my only reason to exist is in constant conflict of how tired it makes me feel but I can't decrease what I do because then I lose the only worth I have in my eyes. It's a perpetual, self-reinforcing cycle, leading me to having breakdowns every couple months where I nearly commit but calm myself down enough not to with the thought of how much hassle it would be for my friends to clean my stuff out and empty where I live. It's been this way since I was a kid. I will be the one to end myself. It's a thought I've had since I was 10, and a fact I've accepted, as that part of me is all I've known and is my truth for my whole life. It's my version of normal, a type of self-regulation. I just don't know when or why but I do understand it all stems from the feeling of exhaustion. And I know that once I do get my degree there is no more academic validation to seek, and that is where maybe my exhaustion will end. One way or the other, once I am faced with breaking down my established 'normal'.

I think the problem lies in how we made our societies work. Too many of us no longer fit the mold; we don't want to continuously fail to meet the standard of what's expected of us to be human. I'd love to live life as an observer outside of the human world, but realistically it'll never be possible. Humans ruin everything, even existence. Being born to see how beautiful the world is but being unable to experience it is just cruel.

As a suicidal person, I resent that so many think they can speak for me. "I know you don't really want to die. Nobody does." I understand that when people say this, what they usually mean is that people want the pain to stop and death is only instrumental in that. This is like saying, "You don't want surgery. You just want the issue you're getting surgery for to go away." But is it true that people don't ever want death for its own sake? I'm not so sure. Wouldn't that imply that everyone wants to live forever, or at least that everyone would want to live forever if life were purely blissful? I think it makes sense to have a preference to not be conscious, especially given that in reality, consciousness always involves suffering. You won't be there to experience the lack of consciousness (which is the point), but while you're here, you can make a judgement.

putting it here for all who are asking: This video was uploaded about a month prior, but due to sponsorship problems it got postponed. Check the channel's Community section to see the timeline.

When my therapist asked if I was experiencing suicidal ideation, I told him it was more like a desire to not exist. I guess I don’t wish I was dead. I just wish I was never born.

There was a night that I just lied in bed with a feeling of just existing. Existing with no purpose, no feeling of mattering to anyone. It is not a feeling I would wish on my worst enemy.

sometime ago I told a friend that my only true wish, was for total oblivion, to simple close my eyes and stop existing. I can't say with total conviction, that I have had a bad life, nor that I don't feel love, but all I can say for sure, and have been saying for the better part of my adult life now, is that if I were to die today, I'd die a happy and satisfied life. When I was a child, a freak incident put me really close to death, but a cranial surgery brought me back. I was only a kid, who didn't know any better, and for a brief moment, stopped being alive. From that point on, every happy or unhappy moment in my life comes with this perspective, I could've just stopped existing way before this happened. The first quote of this video, really shocked me. I felt the words as their meaning made a fundamental sense into my being 'it is already too late'. It is true, all those things that happened are already gone, it's in my past now. I can't say where this new meaning will bring me, or change me, but I'll probably never forget it, as I think about death, my death, every day. I still believe, that my time will come, hopefully soon, something happening to me, and I'll be able to stop existing, and feel unbelievable peace, as I pass away once again. I am incredibly thankful for you making this video.

Thank you for calling out Better Health! It's disgusting so many RU-vidrs are still promoting it.

‘Suicide is an apology for having ever existed’ is such a profound, poignant and painful truth.

I’m autistic, I don’t feel emotions, especially strong ones, very well. The lack of purpose and simple desire to have never been born is something i’ve felt very frequently in the past and this video really resonated with me and did the topic justice. As i’ve aged i’ve gotten better at coping with reality and existence and things are better now. I could never kill myself but in the state of mind I had entered i was completely capable of understanding how someone could. Thank you for this additionally, major respect for the rejection of the sponsorship, if I wasn’t a broke college student I would support your patreon as you have displayed strong moral character.

I believe that when it comes to suicide, you can only ever answer the question "Why" with theories. You can analyze behavior all day long, but you'll only ever have a theory. You can never actually know the truth, because the only person who can tell you can't tell you anymore. My dad committed suicide when I was young, and I told my cousin that whole theory, and my cousin responded with something he clearly thought was the truth. I just told him, "That's a good theory." He refused to believe that his supposition was only a theory, and that he had the definitive answer. You can never know why. You can never get closure with the truth. You can never ask for the truth. You can only accept that a person that was there now isn't.

The worst thing a human being can experience is to exist in the first place, the notion of life itself is a curse (quote from somewhere, I forgot)

There is this feeling I've been getting once every 4 months or so for around 10 years already. The best I could describe it is that it's a feeling of being extremely uncomfortable with existing. It's like feeling actual pain from existing, but in the entire brain. It happens so suddenly at random times. I remember when I first experienced it at 8 years old, I told my mom about it - about how it hurts and how weird it feels. When it happens, I have this extremely strong desire and extremely strong urge to not exist. I don't mean dying, but literally- to not exist. I suddenly become very aware of my existence. EDIT: I just remembered my mom told me that once when I was around 6 years old, I was walking joyfully down a corridor but, all of a sudden, I stopped and stared at nothing for like a minute. So maybe that's when I really started experiencing this.

I discovered your channel because of the video of not wanting to exist and now i revisit it because of not wanting to be born

To clarify a bit: suicidal ideation is different from suicide. If my description of suicide disagrees with your personal experience, this might be why… Joiner’s point is that there are psychological differences between those who succeed in dying and those who attempt and fail, and of course, even those who only have suicidal thoughts. Joiner has a lot of evidence to support these claims in his book. I’ve suffered from suicidal ideation before but I’ve never been suicidal. If I had expressed my thoughts to a therapist I wouldn’t be hospitalized against my will, but how to explain this? I believe Joiner’s book does a great job detailing why certain people are at higher risk for dying from suicide than others. I think the way he explains it in terms of psychology is brilliant. I understand I could have done a better job explaining such an important distinction.

As you said, the wish to merely no longer exist can be a product of the lack of connection - the feeling of not just being worthy of love, but also the feeling that you may never be. What's most painful is trying, and failing, again and again, to the point you think you'll never be good at something, being proven time and time again that your efforts, your time, your love, your BEING hasn't amounted to anything, and it never will. What hurts is trying to make those connections, time and time again, and being left with nothing, time and time again. Everyone thinks introverts are the only victims of this pain. No one thinks about the ones who desperately try. It's not about extroversion, it's about loneliness. We want to be wanted too. "They always seemed so happy, so friendly. I didn't know what they were going through."

Finally! Ive never opened a notification faster in my life

As someone who was c sectioned, born blue, with the chord wrapped around my neck and later odd and died for 5 minutes we most certainly can conceptualize non existence. It’s bliss

Having a chronic illness, even one as manageable as Diabetes, the desire comes from a huge amount of frustration against yourself, the world, the food, the medication and more. Imagining being able to eat something without a worry or concern for bolus or medications, or feeling alright even without having to eat every 2 hours...then it comes into "I wish it wasn't here". "I wish I wasn't here". Its a fast step into the desire of things not existing, out of overwhelming feeling of what can or cannot be controlled. I always felt when, I desire to not exist here, it is my search to recover control into a world that is over complex, unable to be tamed or changed by sheer force of work from my own. Then you realize its ok to be unable to control life, or people, or all of your health...specially on an ill day with diabetes where you to into high spikes or you messed your insulin and get lows. Desire of non-existence is really desire for a real control in our lives, probably. Maybe. I don't know.

"Stupid" "Asshole" "Selfish" "Ungrateful" "Dumb" "Evil" "Malevolent" "Pitiful"... Out of all the things that you said, "Selfless" was what struck me the most. The word kinda beamed inside of me. It was what made me cry. I've never experienced the featherweight feeling of being seen. Thank you so much.

"Silence productive sleep schedule, half-hour long video essay on the loathing of life is talking."

I think the addition of Shinji and Evangelion in this is important. I feel like he is the epitome of wanting to die but not wanting to kill himself

it's amazing how some people will go through life never knowing how it feels to want to die (or want so badly so live they want to die). that's a blessing tbh

15:48 Yeah. The desperate need to feel like you belong somewhere. Being bullied or ignored just intensifies the negative. Lifelong depression opens your eyes to more than one would want but if you get through to a more stable life, your empathy and understanding will be your greatest strength.

My experience with suicidal thoughts was different from what you described in the video. I know people care for me, I know I am loved. I know I’m selfish for wanting to die, but I just want the hurt to stop, you know?

The day I was born was the worst day of my life. When I'm with others, I am alone, and there is no me there.

Good on you not accepting a sponsorship from Better Help. Doing that alone gets so much respect from me. There's even bigger channels who claim to care about mental health and still take their sponsorship.

saw this was posted and instantly clicked, i just know i'm in for a painful, relatable video

I've watched Monster a couple times over the years. Great series. Always nice to see people talk about it. And tying it into a feeling I've often felt was a nice touch. Excellent video.

I’m a 36-year-old man who feels like my best days are behind me, and have always held a resentment toward my parents for bringing me into this world that I never asked to be a part of. Some days it takes all the energy I can muster just to get up and live another day. I’ve already decided that I will live long enough to see my mother pass and then I will check out as soon as she’s gone. I can’t inflict the pain of my loss on her, so for now I will go through the motions.

Depression means I fear death yet do not want to be

the thing for me is the opposite, it took me so long to actually feel my existence. when I was a kid I had so many problems with no explanation, it took me 19 years to realize the reason behind all of those was I didn't know how to exist. Their solution for me was just to change myself, and I did that for a long time. I changed so much that if I met my past self, I couldn't recognize myself anymore. right now the only thing I want to do is to find who I actually am, for me, it's hard to exist, it's like I'm ashamed to exist as the one I am. I tried to be someone else so I could feel what they felt, but I was unable to do that. so there were two choices for. I chose to just simply exist, be shameless and open my eyes every new day without looking for a higher purpose or anything that i can't understand. i don't need those to live, i just need to move forward. that's it. i'm a simple person with simple desires. the moment i realized that, even seeing trees were enough to feel loved.

TW suicide. I think about wanting to die every single day since i was little and at some point in my misery i asked “well why?” I’m here with a collective heart (and some therapy sessions up my sleeve) analyzing my attempts and it was really a pure sense of hopelessness and physical pain that was felt from the tip of your toes to the top of you head. Every single part of your body feels off and you want to get yourself out of there. And death sounds like a pain killer. It is the most tunnel vision experience and you don’t even realize you are at the verge of death until the very last second. Your brain is echoing the same thing over and over and over not even you can interrupt it. And you genuinely feel a weight lifted off your shoulders when you’re like “fine I’ll just die” because you can. And you are. That’s the truth. “Nothing matters we are all gonna die”. I only got out by fantasying of my death (while waiting to die after to attempt) and how my absence would look like and then I thought of the people in that distant future and I calmed down. it was only after I fail I was about to think. I still feel myself at the side of death everyday but maybe that’s because I was born haha. It’s weird to think about not having depression because that’s literally all I know. It’s weird to think about not existing because that’s all I’ve been. But it’s weird we get to think in the first place so. Nothing matters we’re all gonna die. I finds peace in constants. At some point that was my death because no matter what I do I’ll be dead eventually. But now it’s curiosity. If something else in this life is true it’s that you’ll never know everything. So now I want to know everything because I won’t be done even when I’m dead. I’m saying this because I genuinely genuinely believed it was normal to want to die until I was told other wise. I imagine it’s the same on the other side of the coin. Anyway I hope people talk about this more because life’s answers are in the minds of the mentally ill but people are too proud …check on your loved ones and tell them you love them fr. The thought of you can save people too (I’m proof)

8:48 bro looks so cozy im jealous 😭😭

I don't wish to never been born. I just wish I was a cat. Roaming around, eating here and there without a care in the world. 😢

Really great video, if I could say something a lot of suicidal people tend to think this way : "I don't want to die, but I'd rather not continue living with this pain", they then proceed to take the less painful path.

This is exactly how I feel. Despite that I'm a Muslim. Many Westerners don't seem to know that religious people also deal with such thoughts.

Stayed up for this and you posted it the day after

Been looking forward to this😭🙏

I frequently find myself feeling this. Though as you so eloquently put, it's quite a nuanced and unclear feeling. A previous video of yours, "The Desire to Not Exist" resonated greatly with me and also I felt echoed much of how I frequently feel. Thank you for putting feelings like these to words one can ponder and understand.

My mother duped my dad, stopped taking BC and used pregnancy as a way to try and keep him. Thankfully it didn't work out with them, but I am a birth that should have never happened. I was a tool for continuing a toxic marriage. Now I coast through life, with no purpose and only wishing I was never here. I feel so undesireable and lonely. Unwanted. I know my dad deeply cares for me and my mom has since been cut from my life but I can't escape the feeling of wanting to never have been born. I'll be 35 in less than a week and I feel like I'm going to be alone forever. It sucks. I just want to feel wanted.

I feel no joy in my existence, i come back home ready to go, only to wake up the next morning...ohh Life!.

I don't know when my dissatisfaction with life began. There are possible starting points, but it goes back too far to recall. All I remember was the first time I looked up at the sky and thought to myself, "is this it? Life is boring." Nothing but pain and a struggle to survive. It's tiring. More than sad or happy, it's simply exhausting.

Osamu Dazai, Monster and the trouvle with being born in the same video??? Im so unbelievably hapoy tight now.

The intensity of my loneliness and my desire and ache for love are all-consuming

I know that I’ve experienced the yearning for non-existence. Though I know there is no way for what has been done to be undone. Even if my existence were erased there is now an absence where I used to be. Most of my suicidal thoughts are out of frustration and anxiety of having to live. People live for such a short amount of time but when I am faced with the years of potential life I feel the process weigh on me. Living is an exhausting process but like exercise it is worth doing for your own sake. Though recently I’ve found that I feel unworthy of life. In order to be better you need to want to be better and sometimes I can’t bring myself to want that. I deny myself the right to take up time and space to exist in whatever way. Though I almost feel as if my worth has been compromised. Not by myself but by the world around me. I don’t want to exist in a world that hates me and despite all the evidence that it doesn’t I still feel the sharp edges cutting into me. Certain people do not want me to exist and it’s for things I cannot control. My gender, sexuality, race, neurodivergence. It does not fit into whatever prepackaged thing that those people subscribe to. And it’s not just that those people exist with such bigotry but that a lot of them make it their life’s work to be weird about it. Some people go into certain careers with the intention of using violence against people like me and the people I love. They make it harder to live knowing that the way our society is built tells me that I’m not worth the time or the space to simply be and how I’ve internalized it and sometimes the only thing that keeps me going is the idea of becoming another static that people will use against more people like me. I go through this process of rage and then depression and then exhaustion with life. If there’s any concern I’m currently doing pretty alright. Trying to like actually think about how to survive in this modern dystopia as someone that would implode if put into certain environments. At this point I do not wish for happiness I just want to be content. My existence is bearable for the time being until it is not bearable due to uncontrollable or controllable conditions. TL;DR Bro living is kinda ass Still gonna do it tho

I just discovered this channel and I thought you quit, after seeing your upload history. I was very much delighted to have been graced with this upload. 🙏

Never realized others felt this way... My wife has acted like it's crazy for me to wish I wasn't born, but seems to be fairly common sadly.

It's not about wanting to die. It's about wanting to escape pain. Imagine being in a burning building on the tenth floor. Do you let the flames continue to burn you, or do you leap out the window? In choosing to live, you have to endure the pain. You have to regrow the skin, suffer a long painfull healing process until it is thick enough to witstand the coarseness of life. It will inevitably leave you scarred and deformed. And then, only then can you bear to see your existence through others which would you choose?

"we are actively building ourselves in response to the void" damn, great quote

This is easily the best analysis of Monster I've seen! Makes the story of Johan much darker!

I want to congratulate you for dropping your sponsor, that says alot about your character and you've earned my respect on that alone. Every time I hear/see one of their ads I cringe; knew something was up with them. Great video content too, thank you.

“Hated by life itself” is a song that I reflect on when I have moments like this.

Watching this and the "Desire not to Exist" back to back shows how much you have grown as a content creator and person. Keep it up.

I don’t think I’ve ever been actively suicidal but growing up and a large portion of my adulthood I sure did wish I had never been born or that I could just simply not exist anymore. It is kind of a relief to see I wasn’t alone in that.

What a beautifully written piece of art. I am privileged to deeply know every reference you make, it's as if this was written by and for myself. What a comfort it is to know that someone else thinks and feels so similar to me.

I’m tired of life when that time comes I will welcome the peace

I've been battling depression for most of my life. This is all articulating something I have not been able to. Thank you for talking about this. Truly, thank you. The way you describe this just shattered me and the tie in with anime resonated. I'm grateful you just walked me through my thoughts.

I've had suicidal thoughts in the past, though I don't think I ever wanted to simply not exist or never be born. The closest feeling I've had was when I felt very depressed. wishing that nothing existed save for my bedroom- no door or windows, no outside world, no other people. I wouldn't grow old or hungry or thirsty, I could either sit and draw for as long as i wanted, then settle into bed and sleep soundly for thousands or even millions of years. Then I'd wake up and everything would be back to normal, and I'd fix myself breakfast.

this video saved my life

Starting the day off right with this one 🔥🔥🔥

Cioran is one of my favorite writers and this was really good. Subscribed.

The Monster OST hits hard!

That is an oversimplification. Maybe in most cases people want to die or never to have been born because they believe others would have wanted it, or others would be better off, but not always. When I was depressed I believed I was a mistake and that the world would be a better place without me so I wanted to die. But much later, when I wanted to have never been born I fully realised that probably my parents' lives would have been worse without me, almost definitively. But I wanted to have never been born still. For me. I was tired of everything, life, existence, having to make any effort for anything, feeling like it is my obligation to try to do my best for others, just because I was forced into this existence without any choice. It was inherently selfish desire to never exist, and I am even now not sorry for that. It makes sense to not want to be thrust into any responsibility without your choice, and life comes with many responsibilities. It is inherently unfair, and that is why I am an antinatalist. Desire to die and to never have existed are different after all

CIORAN MENTIONED 🇷🇴🇷🇴🗣 Edit: my mom told me when I was little (like between 2 and 3) I wished to have been born by myself, and would even cry at the thought I did not come into the world by myself... I still don't know what was going on in my head

If one is never born, then one can neither please nor anger Gid, and cannot be subject to hell. It is better to never have been.

I felt this since I was young.. I'd stare at space, on my hand, and before sleeping.. contemplating why I exist, and what's there beyond "existing".. and "being".. I didn't have words for them, but I remember the mulling of those thoughts.

8:30 only the real ones know this song

I got chills at the end. This really is an eye opener. Fantasy keeps the world going. And not wanting to exist is different than being suicidal. Amazing explanation and references.

Hey Man, I just want to let you know if you even see this comment that your videos have helped me so much in understanding what I feel and what others may be going through. As someone who has had trouble their whole life in figuring out what makes me as a person actually feel and be "human" due to my very confusing emotionally separated parents who didn't let me talk about my own emotions without backlash or them gaslighting me, these videos help me so much in figuring out how to feel those things, that it's okay to feel things, and that it's okay to ask for help. In other words, thank you. Thank you so much. I wish you knew how much these videos help so many people in so many different ways.

You give me a good buffer to psychological ideas. Love this channel. I already know that even trying to grasp concepts of this nature will surely make me more depressed than I already am

i havent existed for billions of years before i was born, it has done me no harm. I cannot imagine it being diffrent for the billions of years to come after my time has passed.

real asf for not taking better help sponsorship and amazing vid, instant sub

Watching full thing again cause I done need it 🔥

I've found that the best way to satisfy the desire to have never been born is to be forgotten

6:58 holy shit somebody in a position of “power” finally telling @Betterhelp to shove it is insanely commendable. I was gonna make a joke about how it was lowkey sad hearing him say “this is where I’d put and Ad but I don’t have one” until he said it’s because his morals are stronger than his wallet. Mr.Ballen, Infographics/all their sub-channels, the amagi, it goes on and on of people that definitely know “betterhelp” isn’t confidential like they advertise couldn’t care any less. Now the ones that go and make it personal about how depressed they were how therapy or even how betterhelp itself “saved” them, makes me the most sick. It’s bs and good for you for not pushing that farce down your viewers throats. 👏🏻 👏🏻 👏🏻

I've been wishing that I've never been born ever since I was 15. I'm 29 now, and that wish grows stronger every year. I was forced into existence by two selfish people who had no right to be parents. My father is angry, massive narcissist and my mom is weak willed woman who put up with his crap and made us do it too. Truth is, I feel so much resentment towards them.

Emil M. Cioran is one of the most important philosophers of late modern times. Engaging with his works does give you a sense of understanding. You understand everything. Because nothing is everything. From there and only form this point on you are able to value things in life. Value connections. People. Free yourself from wrong ideals. Just live according to your animalistic desires. We consider ourselves to be the pinnacle of creation, the intelligent species par excellence, and only those animals whose abilities resemble ours are deemed worthy of this appellation. We are animals and as such, doing intelletual games which are just dishonest in their very nature won't bring you far. The only way to escape the horrors of consciousness is by love. The decadent western civilization is full of distractions which leads to people wandering and searching for superficial, brief and narcissistic happiness. The market in that sense is saturated by wrong fantasies which lead people astray. Modern men is getting lost in translation, unable to find a place in this utterly cosmic horror. Glad to see a resurgence of Cioran.

It's been a little while since I've watched through all of Monster, but this made all those memories come flooding back. I think that Johan's landscape of death, is, in a way, the last puzzle piece falling perfectly into place. The doctor who saved his life deciding that he made a mistake, shooting him... It's as though he's trying to get word from God, undeniable proof that what he suspected was correct. That the love of even God was conditional, that all people are deeply flawed and shouldn't exist. Johan being shot by the doctor who saved his life would be like God admitting to him that he made a mistake, that there was no such thing as unconditional love. If someone as deeply flawed as him had value, that would mean all his victims had value... If none of them had value, if the world was devoid of names and filled by illusion instead of souls worthy of love, then Johan would have nothing to regret. With confirmation like that, all of his efforts to him would have not been for nothing. Or, at worst, everyone else's efforts would have been equally pointless. Killing people past that point would just be meat moving into different phases of condition, from fresh to tender to rotten... It's as though he was trying to do an experiment crossed with a treatise on the human condition, to prove a point he was himself agnostic about but yet still more sure of than anything else. He had made up his mind, but he was open to criticism from someone like God. Stirring up trouble might get God's attention... Anyways, that's only relevant to part of the video. The wish to never have been born is a fascinating one... I see it as a placebo drug in a sense. A survival mechanism in the brain is triggered, as though one is doing something productive for avoiding future pain. People get addicted to these things, these thoughts that carry psychoactive effects. Someone who kills themselves is really just signing up for a different experience, a 'lack of sensation sensation' so to speak. Beyond a certain point the only way to get a very particular high of belonging, after years of diminishing returns, is to engage in risky behavior that might actualize it. It's a delusion fueled by an addictive sensation, where eventually the only way to get one's fix is to take a lethal dose. This whole thought of "a better world without" is the drug. After being administered, most people die in withdrawal when they overdose. It's so quick and fleeting, this positive and sweet feeling. That you're doing something nice for the community, that you're a loving person to people who rarely show the same love to you, that you're special for being "wise" enough to realize you're not special. It really does feel nice in the moment, it feels really good. From personal experience the largest high happens prior to committing to something that could kill you, it's like how dopamine works as an anticipatory thing. Having already committed to the action, no matter how bad the withdrawals are... you'll probably die feeling like crap. It's just how it is. More people need to be aware of this, how most suicides happen impulsively because it's entirely congruent with fatal overdoses. Get a healthy transfer addiction, something that makes you feel just as good without nearly as much negative effects. For some people that's indulging in various "real" drugs, or sex and gambling. I suggest drinking water as a good place to start, but frankly all of those are very preferable to literally killing yourself. Most of the time people indulge in these kinds of placebo drugs because they have no access to better ones, a bit like the people who huff glue in third world countries. Love yourself, have a good time. All these "reasons" are just mental justifications for getting another fix, so be honest with yourself. One love.

I swing back and forth between a desire to not have been born and active suicidal thoughts. Its a hard struggle, ive come close a few times. There's rarely a time now when I don't feel my death would go unnoticed, or even celebrated. I've let myself become desensitized to physical pain, I've even grown to almost enjoy it. I can't take anything said about me seriously unless it's blatantly negative. Im doing better now but i still struggle with suicidal ideation.

Thank you for this Video it randomly popped up on my RU-vid feed while working on my final thesis and preparing for my last two oral diploma exams. I don't have really anyone in my surrounding who seems to understand me and my thinking this feeling of being disconnected as you describe it has been a crucial part of my life since I can ever think. No matter the occasion and if Im actually out with family or with "friends" (I never really had friends outside of my classmates and once the education was completed the contact would be severed indefinitely) this feeling of feeling alone always just never disappeared. Even if I had a nice day as many would describe where nothing went wrong and maybe you even went to the cinema the question would always arise did I ever deserve this ? And I never could say yes. The first time I had the thought of not wanting to live was at a very young age it was a time I was outcasted by most of the people I had seen as friends and a time where I only focused on my happiness by playing video games endlessly which ultimately dropped my notes. But during high school at a time where you didn't fit in in school and didn't really have friends gaming was the only thing that really kept me alive or was worth living for when I could feel the glimpse of happiness in front of screen. This spiraled getting being bullied pretty fast at a point I couldn't even fathom how it had come to this point. One day I had enough came home and really had enough and for some reason I wrote on my bed sheet under my pillow I wanna die or I wish I didn't live. Which was discovered by my mom the next day a speech from my dad about what religion tells us and that someone who ends themselves would burn in hell for eternity. Of course that never helped feeling so disconnected purposeless and hopeless feels like a curse. When everyone around me somehow works has a company or a passion and they look so full of energy is just not understandable to me. And talking to people who had harmed themselves and had suicidal thoughts don't understand me either. It is just hard living in a World where no one seems to get you and you feel totally out of place. I guess the only good thing is that it won't matter if or how I lived in a hundred years and all about me will be forgotten.

How is nonexistance impossible to imagine? Everyone who has gone through a deep, dreamless sleep knows what it’s like to feel and think nothing--hell, anyone who’s been knocked out knows the lack of feeling. It’s not particularly difficult to imagine the world before or after your current existence either.

on the tail end of debating kms and honestly this video helped me realize I should just live even if it hurts. I can squeeze some good out of it before there is nothing. Thank you

The world is a dump. I never want to start my day.

Thank you so much for such a beautiful video! I cried at the end. I rewatched from 35:08 till the end more times than i can count.

31:00 I think it’s not that victims of suicide believe everyone they love actively wants them dead. It’s just the belief that everyone won’t really care much once they’re gone.

I had a long comment about the first five minutes but then realized fourteen minutes in you have completely changed topics. People - Stay. On. Topic.

Sometimes when im really depressed i can feel what its like to be non existent, it happened yesterday and i nearly had a panic attack

I was not expecting an anime review out of this! Great video by the way

I agree with most of the video except the parts where you insist suicidal people don't really want to die. That's simply not true. Most of us truly do want to die, it's our families who want us to live.

So happy this is out now! I've felt like this for so long. I wish I was never born, but I don't want to die. Thank god someone made a video about this. Thank you

I’m a simple person- I see Johan in the thumbnail, I click

Man I clicked on this while contemplating the thing and this was probably the most helpful thing I could have watched. Unfortunately physical disability and chronic pain add another layer to this in my case and in so many others. People with fibromyalgia commit the big S at 10x the rate of the whole population. Chronic pain and constant fatigue are incredibly isolating, and on top of that there is a very real desire to not be in pain anymore physiologically. The fantasy in my case goes back and forth between living a fulfilling happy life and overcoming the disability and the thought that I wouldn't be in pain and wouldn't be constantly burdening and disappointing those around me if I wasn't here at all. But I am here. And I'm very drunk lol