The Will To Live

Why Having The Will To Live Is So Important!

We’ve just run a CQC course with Lofty Wiseman and Ginge Johnson.

During the course Lofty gave a talk on ‘The Will To Live’ which Ginge kept referring back to throughout the day.

Obviously Lofty and Ginge were drawing on their experience is the SAS, but the principle of the ‘Will To Live’ is more far reaching than that.

Losing the will to live or our motivation and drive can have negative consequences in our lives.

Now this will happen to most everyone from time to time, for a relatively short period of time.

But what if this is happening for extended periods of time?

Well in many cases losing the will to live has resulted in death?

This is called ‘psychogenic death’.

You remember hearing about old couples who die within hours of each other from a broken heart.

Unfortunately, there’s no explanation or physical reason for their death – it’s an emotional and mental death which is also called giving-up- itus.

This term was first coined by medical officers during the Korean War where they described it as a condition where a person develops extreme apathy, gives up hope, relinquishes the will to live and dies, despite the lack of an obvious physical cause.

Viktor Frankl, in his book ‘Man’s Search For Meaning’ described how in Nazi concentration camps when a prisoner took out a cigarette and lit it, their campmates knew the person had truly given up, had lost faith in their ability to carry on and would soon be dead.

As you should know, our brains have an incredible amount of power, so much so that it can create mechanisms for survival which, if used conversely, can actually lead to our demise instead.

This is why developing a positive mindset based around the will to live is so important!

So whatever you are going through at the moment, be it a personal or relationship crisis, a financial issue, losing your job, worrying about the increasing cost of living, whatever it is, never lose the will to live!

Nothing lasts forever!

Never Give Up!