Wednesday, 9 June 2010

A beautiful neologism

From
http://www.suicidology-online.com/pdf/SOL-2010-1-5-18.pdf

Review
Edwin S. Shneidman on Suicide
Antoon A. Leenaars

The word "psychache" is a word that is synonymous with my phrase (and
others I'm sure) "soul pain".

"
As I near the end of my career in suicidology, I think I can now say
what has been on my mind in as few as five words: Suicide is caused by
psychache (sik-ak; two syllables). Psychache refers to the hurt,
anguish, soreness, aching, psychological pain in the psyche, the mind.
It is intrinsically psychological – the pain of excessively felt shame,
or guilt, or humiliation, or whatever. When it occurs, its reality is
introspectively undeniable. Suicide occurs when the psychache is deemed
by that person to be unbearable. This means that suicide also has to do
with different individual
thresholds for enduring psychological pain (Shneidman, 1985, 1992a).
(Leenaars, 1999, p. 239).
"

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We It comes in part from an appreciation that no one can truly sign their own work. Everything is many influences coming together to the one moment where a work exists. The other is a begrudging acceptance that my work was never my own. There is another consciousness or non-corporeal entity that helps and harms me in everything I do. I am not I because of this force or entity. I am "we"