Imagine living for 30 years in a state of mental confusion induced by all the antidepressants various doctors kept pushing down your throat. And one day you find the courage to stand up to them, rid your system of all the drugs and wake up to discover you lost 30 years of your life. This is, in brief, the story of an American woman, Jane Tholen, who managed to reclaim her life as a drug-free person at the age of 70. The waking-up process and realization of what you've lost is horrifying, to use her own term.
However, it is not about the giant antidepressants business that I want to write about, but about this waking up to discover you've wasted a great part of your life under some mind-altering influence. It could be anything, religion, a controlling mother or simply complying with a social norm that condemns you to a boring unhappy life.
Let's say you were brought up in a devout church-going family and you were taught most things the others enjoy are sinful. Like spending a night out with your college mates or going to a rock concert and lets' not even mention casual sex.
Let's say you had an artistic soul, but were told you need to get real, be an engineer like your father and spend your whole life doing something that brings you no joy.
Let's say you grew up being told you need to obey your parents all your life because, well, they raised you and fed you. And if you don't do as you're told, you're an ungrateful child. And you definitely shouldn't marry X, he's a loser. Or the opposite – you must marry Y, have a family, make us proud, what would the neighbors say?
I'm not making up these examples, I'm actually describing people and families I know.
Hard questions
What happens when you wake up to realize you've missed out on a much happier life just because you've let yourself be influenced by someone else's judgment?
Let's say some major event in your life makes you question all your religious beliefs. Or the parents who have been pushing your buttons all your life die and you discover life as a free person. Or the partner you didn't have the guts to leave all those years ago suddenly dies.
How can you cope with the knowledge you could have had a different life? How can you come to terms with the fact that you've been lied to or, even worse, that you've been telling yourself lies all your life?
Tell the truth?
One other big question – what do you do when you see someone wasting his/her life? Not according to your own, possibly flawed, judgment. According to their own judgment and general unhappiness.
Do you have the courage to tell them - look, this relationship is making you miserable, get out of it.? Do you have the right to say such a thing? Is it even the decent thing to do – waking someone up to the news that they've wasted all their lives? Not that this is an easy thing to do - some people simply refuse to hear you, while others look at you like you must definitely be crazy. Sometimes I wonder if it's not kinder to let people go on with their lives as best they can.
What do you think?
Thanks for reading
Images: Pixabay