Because depression is so thematically powerful and so dark, when it's very severe, it can make people feel not only as if they've lost a loving connection, but as if the whole world is devoid of love. So if we wonder how somebody could take 149 people with him when he commits suicide, one answer can be that depression, when it's most severe, can make people feel that life is completely without value, not just for them but for anyone.

But that's the hardest part of healing.' What?' Realizing there's no one to hate.

...the horrific fact that our lives and those of the people we love are impermanent and exquisitely fragile, that any of us can cease to exist without warning, that loving anyone, anywhere, at any time, leaves you infinitely vulnerable at every single moment. (20)

But insight doesn't necessarily produce self-control. Sometimes you just see your destructiveness more clearly.

A jealous husband is an ugly thing.

We are, all of us, crippled and twisted. Most of us strive desperately to keep our grotesqueries out of sight and mind. Our suffering is transformed by an alchemy of the soul into addiction, ulcers, strokes, hatred, even war.

Because depression is so thematically powerful and so dark, when it's very severe, it can make people feel not only as if they've lost a loving connection, but as if the whole world is devoid of love. So if we wonder how somebody could take 149 people with him when he commits suicide, one answer can be that depression, when it's most severe, can make people feel that life is completely without value, not just for them but for anyone.