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folkhemmet
30-November-2005, 02:05 AM
The pain of rejection can defeat one person whereas another person may shake it off with relative ease. What makes the pain so severe for some that they self-destruct? I would like to put forth a hypothesis on this issue: at least some of those who end up destroying themselves because of the pain of rejection, even if most of the time they are level-headed, transition from level-headedness into a trance-like fixated state of irreversible morbidity. The state is quasi-hypnotic. The person involved has passed the 'point of no return' much like Michael Douglas's character did in the Hollywood film "Falling Down." In fact, toward the end of the 1993 film Douglas's character was faced with, after being rejected by his younger wide and losing his source of employment, a choice of life or death; he ended up choosing death.

Of course, people are a product of their genetic make-up as well as their environment. But to say this is trivial and has not helped the rejected. Perhaps the tragedy of those who choose death after facing rejection is that a mechanism may be at work in their minds that cannot be explained, cannot be touched. It is irreversible because it is irresolvable.

If we could elucidate this mechanism might there then be way to save the lives of those who have reached the post-rejection terminal phase? However, should we want to save their lives if they feel as though their lives are no longer bearable? might we be being selfish to keep them going in a tortured state? It seems that the solution to this problem, the only way to bring the rejected back from the brink is to reverse the rejection. Cloning, parallel universes, and virtual reality may provide us with a less than ideal way of accomplishing this reversal. In any case, many intriguing issues surround the nature of fatality-inducing rejection. I am curious as to what you all think....How have you managed your rejections? Have you known of those haven't been able to cope?

paulie jay
30-November-2005, 02:15 AM
I think that it's probably a matter of individual emphasis. The degree of pain felt by rejection being directly proportional to the amount of emotion the person has invested in the events leading up to that rejection.

farmerjumperdon
30-November-2005, 03:04 AM
I think it has more to do with how people learn to handle rejection in their early years. Very early years, like say 3 to 6 or 7. People are certainly mallable after that age, and some more than others, but from most of the stuff I've read; there seems to be very strong support for those being the most influential years in a persons life by far. And it can go either way depending on how the experiences of those years are interpreted. An abused child can become an abuser, or can become very sensitive to abuse, depending on their perception of the experience; ie - that was so cruel I'll never be like that, or so that's how I can get what I want.

Significant change after that age requires dramatic life-changing events, or incredible discipline at self-examination. All just opinion on my part. Fascinating topic.

I coach a lot of little kids sports teams and I often feel I know the parents from knowing the kids, even before I meet them. I experience a lot of "uh huh" moments when I have a meaningful conversation with the parents for the first time.