Times Of Swaziland: EXISTENTIAL DREAD AND QUESTIONING YOUR EXISTENCE

EXISTENTIAL DREAD AND QUESTIONING YOUR EXISTENCE
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Runsford Laryea on 03/09/2024 10:16:00


IT is no secret that the occurrences of different events and the unfolding of
some experiences in our lives evoke a variety of different psycho-emotional
responses and feelings; some of which linger for longer than others. Questioning
our existence and even sometimes dreading life itself, may be somewhat viewed as
an encapsulation and an indication of an existing depressive state in an
individual and the way they view the world around them.
Emotional
Normally, it is the product of numerous life events that constantly yield
psychological trauma, emotional strain as well as a social environment that is
filled with insecurity and perceived threat. Examples of such are plenty and it
is overtime that the individual experiencing these will begin to succumb to
psychological impacts of these events, eventually leading them towards the
engulfing feelings of psych emotional dread coupled with thoughts of ‘wishing
you never existed’, amongst others.
Failure
Experiencing complex traumas such as loss (of a loved one or relative), losing
employment, being disappointed in a relationship or facing constant failures (in
life, generally) are some instances that weigh psychologically heavy on an
individual, and having to go through such a range of emotions can come at a very
high price for that individual’s mental health.
Also, once-in-a-lifetime worldwide events like the pandemic exposed a large
percentage of humanity to an ‘odd’ world where very few things were within
the bounds of normalcy, and with that came a lot of confusion, inconsistency and
uncertainty.
As relating to feeling a sense of existential dread, consistent negative
experiences figuratively impinge on our sense of being as well as on the
confidence that we have to progress and go on with our lives. We begin to
assimilate the products of all we go through after which, we adopt the
byproducts (the trauma, the emotional reshuffling as well as other psychological
impacts) and allow them to redefine who we are, even after the events have
passed. Slowly, we begin to loathe our lives (and everything in them), not only
that, but we also begin to loathe ourselves and secretly hope to cease existing.
This is the dread of existence that begins to grow and grow, and slowly, this
morphs into a full-blown questioning of one’s own right to exist as these
negatively impacting mental health instabilities begin to show more clearly.
Test
In as much as life itself is a gallery of psychologically impacting instances
that test our resolve with each passing day, it remains a vital point to note
that this should not become a fabric of our being. Therefore, we always ought to
understand that what we go through is solely for the purposes of strengthening
our psychological resolve as well as enlightening to us the different
perspectives and different ways in which we should view the world. Our existence
remains no mistake and essentially, how our survival skill-set is broadened by
the amount of life challenges we manage to sieve our way through day after day.
Even though the impacts of one event may be different from the next, it remains
a way in which we grow our mental health as well as how we develop the necessary
skills to combat the next life obstacle we might face. Send comments to
runsford0505@gmail.com