Is Our Independence Killing Us?

"And the Lord God said, "It is not good that man should be alone; 

I will make him a helper comparable to him."

Genesis 2:18

Lately, there have been a lot of high profile suicides. The most recent were Anthony Bourdaine and Kate Spade, back in 2014 it was Robin Williams and there are many others. It seems that suicide is on the increase but these high profile suicides are simply bringing attention to an epidemic that goes deeper in our society than we care to realize. 

The natural question in the midst of unexplained tragedy is, "Why?"

So we as a society are left to question "Why?" One myth that has immediately been debunked b these high profile suicides is that depression only happens when someone fails. Just looking at these three that I named you can see that they are some of the most successful people in their fields. They were people that others in their field looked up to and attempted to emulate so clearly it was not failure that caused them to give up on life. 

Our goal-oriented, capitalistic, independent society has fed us with the lie that success is the most important thing in life.

We are all taught to strive for success. Even when we are taught that failure isn't so bad it is because we can learn from failure and better succeed but what happens when we finally do succeed? Where do we go from there? 

A one-track mind after success may make us successful but it ultimately leaves us alone.

When God created the heavens and the earth he then created Adam and gave it all to Adam. It's an interesting story when you think about it because Adam never had to strive for success, he had it from the beginning. He never had to strive for a relationship with God and was closer than any other human (other than Jesus) has ever been to God. Yet there was still something missing. God, Himself, declared that it was not good for Adam to be alone. 

The idea that, "All I need is Jesus" is not Biblical.

It sounds very holy to say, "All I need is Jesus!" but it's not Biblical. Think about it. Adam had more of God than any of us could possibly have, sin had not yet entered the world and created a barrier between him and God, and yet God said he was alone and that it wasn't good. We were made to be social creatures. We were made to be dependent on each other. 

American society is built on independence, on doing it ourselves. Even our national day is called Independence Day. We shame people who live with their parents too long and we have given a negative connotation to the word 'dependent'. But here's the thing, we are all dependent on others whether we like it or not. We need each other. We need relationship. 

So what can we do to help prevent depression and suicide?

I'm not saying it is the end all solution but we can start by building relationship with those around us. Make sure that you don't distract yourself so much on your pursuit towards success that you alienate yourself, and if you see someone doing that, make it a point to reach out to them. Ultimately, don't go at it alone and don't let those around you be alone either.