Jennifer Michael Hecht is my guest. Poet, Best-Selling Author, Philosopher, Historian, and appreciator of wonder.

When we feel upset the thought of ending it all is more common than most people think. Research shows that suicide is often an impulsive type of act.

Don't kill yourself. Stay. This show discusses some reasons to stay that you may not have thought of before.

First, some suicide FACTS. 1 Million people take their own lives worldwide per year, and 40,000 in the U.S. per year. 22 U.S. veterans per DAY take their lives, and all these numbers are rising. Needless deaths. These deaths also represent countless hours of suffering for those left behind. This doesn't have to be the case.

We owe it to our future selves and to those around us to make sure that we stay alive and that we help others stay and feel better together. Listen to this important conversation and PLEASE be sure to share it widely with others.

As a prominent atheist philosopher, my guest today may seem like an unlikely advocate against suicide (contemporary atheist/secularist are nearly always associated with right-to-kill-yourself positions). Today, in a fantastic and wide-ranging conversation, Jennifer Michael Hecht presents two arguments from her book "Stay: A History of Suicide and the Philosophies Against it" for why suicide is not a good choice. Instead, staying alive is a virtue we should cultivate in our cultural.

We also discuss her education, background and other work including her dissertation topic of the Parisian Society of Mutual Autopsy: a group of nonbelievers who dissected each other's brains to find out if the brain housed the soul. We discuss her bestselling book "Doubt: A history" and her first love: poetry, (and she reads her poem "History"!), and she talk about her upcoming book "Wonder Paradox" on finding meaning in the conscious human experience.

Other show highlights:
• A long human history of disbelief
• A recentness of finding God within
• What Christians who leave suicide notes say about God (which can cause more suicide)
• What the person under 25 years old who wants to die should realize.
• The mood that wants to kill the other moods.
• Depression is illness. Suicide is behavior.
• On not ever getting to choose WHO suffers by ending your life.
• On Robin Williams suicide.
• On the universe waking up and the wonder of the human mind.

Please give Spark My Muse a good review on iTunes and be sure to stop by sparkmymuse.com for some extra special shownotes, links, and all the other episodes and shownotes. There will be links to books, people, and websites mentioned in this episode, plus another of Jennifer's poems, and much more.

People in 145 countries are listening to Spark My Muse! Thank you, listeners. It means a lot to me that you have spent some time with us.

Come back soon or SUBSCRIBE. Episode are released twice-weekly.
WEDNESDAYS are short "Soul School" lessons.
FRIDAYS are longer conversational-style guest episodes.

xo
-Lisa
#synCREATE