What on earth is “Giving up on Life”?
What does Giving up on Life mean to us – the general public?
WHY do we need to know about this?
Have we ever had the thought that life is simply just too much?
Have we ever felt overwhelmed about anything and everything?
How many of us are ready to Give up on Life?
How many of us feel like we have been Giving up on Life?
How many of us want to end these Giving up on Life feelings?
How many of us already have Given up on Life but don’t know it?
How many of us are aware that our body may have Given up on Life?
How many of us are dragging our bodies around as we have Given up?
How many of us walk around with a daily tension that we just want to Give up?
How many of us are having non-stop crazy thoughts and have Given up?
How many of us think of new things to distract us but inside we have Given up?
How many of us find ways to motivate us and ra ra, but we feel like Giving up?
How many of us wake up and just want to turn over as we have Given up on Life?
How many of us are aware of the constant exhaustion we feel and want to Give up?
How many of us have overwhelming feelings about Giving up on Life?
How many of us simply cannot see a way out of the daily stress of life?
How many of us have lost trust in this world of ours and have Given up on Life?
How many of us can sense a falseness in our world and we just want to Give up?
How many of us look out into the world and see most have Given up on Life?
How many of us witness others in our community who have Given up on Life?
How many of us get caught up in other people’s stuff and we want to Give up?
How many of us spend our time comparing with others and that is why we Give up?
How many of us take on work pressures and coping is so hard, we want to Give up?
How many of us keep on going, but deep down we know we have Given up?
How many of us bop along in life knowing we have Given up a long time ago?
How many of us are totally dishonest and make out we have not Given up on Life?
How many of us find solutions to function because we have Given up on Life?
How many of us become lonely inside, because we have Given up on Life?
How many of us are honest to say we take drugs, because we have Given up?
How many of us seek false relationships because we have Given up on Life?
How many of us don’t like our daily choices, so we want to Give up on Life?
How many of us just can’t stop blaming others and that makes us want to Give up?
How many of us spend loads of time looking at others on social media, as we have Given up on our own life a long time ago?
How many of us want to get out of this ‘Giving up on Life’ syndrome but have no idea where to start?
How many of us wish we could knock out these ‘Giving up on Life’ feelings, but have no clue how to do it?
How many of us, if we are really honest, feel that there is simply no point to life and have made a choice to Give up on Life, the world and its brothers?
How many of us just dream about ‘happy days’ as life sucks in every area and we simply cannot shake off these ‘Giving up on Life’ feelings?
How many of us have compartments of life that feel like we have Given up on, like relationships or work?
Giving up on Life may not be obvious to most of us but what if the signs are there and we are simply not aware of it?
What if the following real life examples are signs of Giving up on Life?
Feeling lonely
Feeling lost inside
Feeling empty inside every single day
Feeling like something is missing
Feeling dis-connected from everyone
Feeling dis-connected from our body
Not wanting to wake up
Nothing to look forward to
Struggling to get to sleep
Sleepless nights most days
Sleeping through alarm clocks
Needing coffee first thing
Needing something with sugar all day
Bopping along in life feeling exhausted
Using substances like alcohol and drugs
Eating crap food and ignoring how it feels
Being out of context with our eating habits
Not able to cope with daily simple tasks
Overwhelmed by the smallest thing
Moods going up and down fast
Making a mountain out of any issue
Super sensitive to what others say
Indulging in the drama and not dealing with it
Always distracting from the real problems
Reading nonsense on Internet
Blaming everyone for life
Ugly thoughts all the time
Convincing thoughts that are not true
Feeling like a victim of circumstances
Resenting siblings
Pretending to be nice to family
Hating parents for childhood hurts
Playing the part by showing up at every family event
Putting up with the arrangements in our relationships
Keeping up with the neighbours to look good
Having a mask at work to hide
Fired at work for no good reason
Lost the promotion
Suddenly lost the job
Talking about retirement in our 30’s
Forced to take early retirement after years of work
Living on state welfare with no exit plan
No motivation to work now or in the future
Struggling with money and the responsibility
More debt than money coming in each month
Having plenty of money and ignoring the world
Running marathons when our body is on the floor
Signing up for the latest fitness craze to look popular
Making the gym the biggest priority in life
Mind hanging out in a very dark place
Finding ways to self-harm everyday
Plotting and planning how to self-harm
Self-harming to the point where it overtakes life
Ignoring close friends
Sabotaging any offers of support
No eye contact with humans
Scared to go out on public transport
Making sure no engaging in social life
Dreading visits to seek medical help
Crying for no reason
Spending hours feeling sorry for self
Making up stuff to cover up feelings of sadness
Day dreaming and staring into space for days
Doing the new age spiritual stuff to escape life
Travelling the world to escape real life stuff
Using hobbies to keep the mind busy
Making out we are doing things for charity
Staying busy with anything and everything
Following others in a congregation, like sheep
Jumping on the bandwagon of what others are up to
Unable to say No to others even when it hurts
Allowing others to abuse us when we know it is wrong
Zero focus on any task in hand
Lack the energy to deal with life
Pointless contributing to life as it sucks
Finding daily chores Boring
Having no purpose in life
Totally lost with no direction
Having repetitive thoughts of ending life
No role models to confirm there is another way
Accepting that a hard life, full of struggle is ok
Dear World
What if we start Giving up on Life at a young age as we never felt truly met by those who raised us?
What if we had feelings of Giving up as a child because we could not sense any real role models?
What if the Giving up on Life seed was planted a long long time ago and we have never been able to move from that?
What if our life force started draining at a young age but it goes undetected as those around us are too exhausted to notice?
What if the draining is because we had to numb our feelings and become something we are truly not?
What if we tried to become something we are not because we wanted to please our parents?
What if the lack of connection we felt as a young child, left a void – an emptiness and we started filling it up with all the distractions the world offers us?
What if this void leads us to ill behaviours that are un-natural but they fill up the gap – the empty feeling that lives inside us every single day?
What if Giving up on Life is because we have a lack of Commitment to Life?
What if taking Responsibility and making a choice to Commit to Life is the answer to the Giving up on Life syndrome?
What if the Simple Living blog “Commitment to Life” has the answer to Giving up on Life?
Could it be that Simple?
If you are feeling suicidal, contact your GP for support or the Suicide Helplines.
In a crisis contact your emergency services.
Suicide Helplines
UK – Samaritans available 24 hours
Tel: 116 123
Childline – for children and young people
Tel: 0800 1111
USA – National Suicide Prevention Lifeline
Tel: 1-800-273-8255
Other Countries
Check International Association for Suicide Prevention Resources on Crisis Centers
https://www.iasp.info/resources/Crisis_Centres
Comments 25
Wow, what a list.
It is interesting to see presented many things we wouldn’t at first sight think are giving up behaviours. But what if every single one of them IS in fact an example of giving up?
What would that tell us about how we are living?
Wouldn’t we then get to look at things through a new lens?
What choices would we make then, if we could see more clearly?
I did not realize that I gave up on life when I was young. It felt like it was to much.
I did all the things that society said I should do, but there was a lost feeling behind it all. I have had dreams all my life about feeling lost, not knowing where I was going.
These dreams have stopped. I am 66 years old and feel like I am starting a new life. It is all about commiting to myself first and then bringing that commitment to the world.
Everyone has a deep desire to help our fellow human beings, but if we feel we have given up then how can we do this?
The first step is to admit that you have given up, and understand why. Then slowly rebuild your life with consistent self care. Then the commitment to life surfaces again.
I had the same reoccurring dreams that Ken mentions, where I was lost in cities always desperately trying to get my bearings, to get home…
These dreams went on my entire adult life until, with the support of Simple Living Global, I recognized my levels of given-up-ness and began to commit to myself and to life.
I am 44 now and no longer have these dreams at all.
I realise that getting frustrated has been a big thing for me. And it has led to me giving up on situations or people, or at least wanting to and then resenting it.
There is a control then throwing-the-towel-in cycle (albeit it subtle) and it is actually super draining.
To see this through the lens of commitment to life is really helpful. It’s kind of freeing. If you at least want to commit to life, then you can start there to change the pattern.
I gave up and withdrew from life, resulting in Chronic Fatigue and could tick many of your list of examples because of this.
When I realised this I started to make changes, to take care of myself, make a commitment to myself, then to the world.. step by step building this as a foundation, so it became my way.
Over time my given-upness stopped, I am now committed to life with energy, vitality and a feeling of purpose… and thoroughly enjoy it.
I have used being busy and doing lots of good things to avoid feeling my giving up ness. If I am doing all the things that society thinks is good, then I must be ok. This logic just makes the giving up ness worse. I am giving up on myself to please the world.
After 50 years of living this lie, I was so exhausted I could barely support myself. I was on my own and did not know what to do.
I knew I needed to do something different, but what? Because I truly asked for the truth I found Simple Living Global, through an amazing set of circumstances. By commiting to do the Back to Basics program and taking responsibility for my life, I am claiming myself back. Living my life the way that I knew was right.
By taking these brave steps back to me, I have received amazing support from the world, in all sorts of ways.
I am feeling ready to get back to living my life in a way that shows people there is another way to live, all we need to do is connect to ourselves and bring that self to the world.
Reading this blog I realise from making a commitment to myself and to life I no longer say ‘ I give up ‘ when in conversation or doing something.
How often do we say ‘ I give up ‘ when something doesn’t go our way, it gets too difficult or when trying to get our point across.
Is this coming from a deeper level of giving up in us?
If we are focusing on working hard so we can create a comfortable life and retire early, is not that a way of giving up on the life that you are living at the moment, focusing on the future?
I am understanding the acting out of teenagers as their way of resisting giving up to a world that they are realizing is fake.
I remember dreading going to school. I could not believe I had to do that. It felt so wrong.
I felt I had no choice. That I had to submit to the misery.
It was the start of giving up myself to a world, that made no sense.
I went to college, because everybody else was, and I avoided being drafted and sent to Vietnam to fight.
I even wonder if getting drafted would have been a better choice.
All these choices were about fear, rather than love.
I am now committing to listening to my inner self that knows what is right for me and the rest of humanity.
It feels true.
When my children were growing up, I felt they were growing up into a world that was much more stressful than when I grew up.
There was much more concern about jobs and the environment and there was rising levels of illness. Less certainty that the world was all right.
For some reason they felt more responsibility, they worried about how they were going deal with the world they were inheriting.
Is it possible that it was not so much the state of world they were feeling but the giving up ness of the world?
I have been coming to terms with this giving up ness that I had, but was ignoring by jumping through the hoops of society so I looked all right. I am understanding that if I am not totally being myself, like a 3 year old, then there is a level of giving up ness.
All I need to do is be myself, and when I do this I am showing my children and the rest of the world that it is OK to be themselves.
When we are just being ourselves, giving up is impossible, because we have everything we need.
‘ I cant be bothered ‘ is another one that feels to me like it’s coming from a giving up energy, a lack of commitment. How frequently do we say or think this in our day to day lives?
There was a time in my life where I could honestly say I had given up on life.
I had no direction, no life force to get going and actually do something about my boring, dead, dull and pointless life.
I had no idea that my choices were the reason I was in that pit in the first place.
There were no real role models and hiding from the world and its brothers was something I became very good at.
For some who know me that would be hard to believe now as I am known for my Absolute Commitment to Life in all areas.
My REAL role models who inspired me and got be on the real road to Truth were Serge Benhayon and his family who most certainly walk the walk and talk the talk.
What I realised that it is possible for anyone to change and what we need is those who are the real deal to present and show us that there is another way to live.
It is for this reason that I am so dedicated in supporting humanity, by bringing awareness to get back on track. I feel it is my duty to ensure I help others, not by teaching or preaching but simply presenting that there is ANOTHER WAY to live as it says in the very first blog on this website.
https://simplelivingglobal.com/is-there-another-way/
What makes us give up on life?
There are many reasons why we may give up on life but is it possible that there could be an underlying root cause of why we give up?
Is it possible that that reason is because we feel we CAN’T and DON’T make a difference, so we give up trying?
It’s quite easy to see how someone, whose life isn’t going well and then to see all what is going on in the world, to feel overwhelmed, to feel inadequate and to not be of any significance.
But what if we were to be just ourselves?
What if we allowed other people to be just themselves?
What if we took responsibility for the choices we make?
What if, in taking responsibility for our choices, we wouldn’t feel so overwhelmed at what is going on in our lives?
What if, in taking responsibility for our choices, we wouldn’t feel the need to distract ourselves with alcohol, drugs, TV, social media, sports, working, hobbies, etc.?
Is it possible that taking responsibility for our choices, we then start to make a difference to ourselves?
Is it possible that in making a difference to ourselves, we then start to make a difference to others?
Is it possible that in making a difference to ourselves and others, we then start to commit to life?
Is it possible that when we start to commit to life, we know we CAN and DO start to make a difference and therefore we wouldn’t feel that our only option is to ‘GIVE UP ON LIFE?’
I know there was a time where I had definitely given up on life.
There were no real role models and my constant search for happiness, love and peace stuff, got me on a cycle of finding money to do the next spiritual new age thing, to the point of becoming an addict. Of course it looked like I was ok, as I was functioning with all the coping solutions I had, but the truth was my body was on the floor with exhaustion and I only realised this after attending a Universal Medicine presentation by Serge Benhayon.
He made so much sense and no one up to this point got to the root of my giving up syndrome.
He nailed it and he was living with vitality levels like I had never seen before.
So after 12 years of clocking this man and seeing how he lives, I am in no doubt he has the answers to stuff life this giving up on life. I took note of what he had to say and then put it into practice, by that I mean Live it to the best of my ability and bingo here I am today with an Absolute Commitment to Life and that means there is not a cell in my body that is giving up on life – never.
https://simplelivingglobal.com/commitment-to-life-part-1/
It would be true to say that a huge part of my work today is supporting others to not give up on life, presenting another way that is possible for all of us regardless of our background.
https://simplelivingglobal.com/is-there-another-way/
When I feel overwhelmed by life, I focus on the individual day to day things.
Take one thing at a time, do it the best I can, then appreciate myself and then move on to the next.
When I get too involved in all the stuff, I feel I need to do that day, it sets me up to be anxious.
When I find myself spinning out, using simple techniques to connect me to my body brings me back.
Simple Living Global has supported me, to remember how to do this.
This sounds like a simple thing and it is, but it is so powerfull. In seconds it can totally change your state of being. Totally change your outlook on life.
When we can truly be with ourself, there is no way we can give up because we have everything we need.
I used to think I was committed to life because I still cared a lot and I was always trying and efforting to make life work…
I could not understand why, no matter how hard I tried to be good, earn a living and be responsible I was always broke, consistently making reckless choices and was often nearly homeless (sometimes living out of my car “car camping”- ‘in-style’ homelessness?).
I found Simple Living Global because I felt the level of truthfulness there that I knew I needed to get myself to look at whatever it was I was choosing that kept my life on the floor.
SLG helped me face that I was dealing with the consequences of my every day choices; that there were many of areas of life I had withdrawn from, where I was entirely not committed and that this was why I was lacking in support and consistency in my life.
With Simple Living Global by my side I have discovered that the more I consistently support myself and commit to being here in this world (something I was never comfortable with) the more support the Universe or God is able to provide me.
Having experienced my life as being like a sieve (in which everything I needed seemed to pour out through my fingers) to building and developing the beginnings of a foundation under me, I can see how, through thousands of self-neglecting choices that lend to a series of giving up choices, a person can end up in abject poverty and even in homelessness and all the horrors that brings with it.
With no blame, judgement or sympathy in the way I can bring understanding and compassion to my own situation or that of another and when I observe things in this way I can see that the way out of trouble is not only clear but very possible.
Thank you Simple Living Global for empowering me with pure truth so I could get my life on track and thank you for supporting my father and the many hundreds of others to also get onto their feel so they can stand up in life as who they are.
Giving up on life is all about our attitude towards life. How we are living every moment.
I have been working loading junk into containers to be thrown away. The room I am cleaning is infested with rats. The temperature I have been working in is 95 degrees F. Because I have given notice to my employers and all these other factors it is easy for me to feel like what I am doing is a waste of time. Easy to feel un committed to what I am doing.
When I am in this state of thinking about all the things that make the job uncomfortable, it is very easy to feel like I am suffering.
But I am noticing that if I just focus on the immediate thing I am doing, all the “suffering” disappears. It is my reaction to what is going on that creates the suffering. It is not about what I am doing it is about how I am doing it.
This was a great revelation to me about how we can create our own reality. How we live, determines what and how we experience life and what we attract to ourselves.
Wow, another confirmation of the power we all have to change our lives.
One of the first ways we start giving up is when we are little and we calibrate what our family and community is comfortable or un-comfortable with, what they reward us for and how they are and we start to suppress and alter our natural way to ‘fit in’…
Is it possible that our world is in trouble because we are not being the sensitive, loving people we really are and this hurts us by making us less harmonious inside and out?
It is time we ask if this world needs more tough or checked out men and women or more women and men connecting to and honouring the tenderness and sensitivity that is the essence of who we all are.
Does a one year old give up when it is learning to walk?
What happens when we get older and face a challenge and decide that it is too much?
If someone presents an opportunity to evolve and we feel it is to much, do we react and start blaming?
Blaming is just not wanting to take responsibility for our life.
Everyone is born with a natural desire to go for it in life.
A young child has no reason to believe it can not fly.
I feel the main reason we give up on life is we are exhausted from not living ourselves, losing that spark that young children have.
Simple Living Global’s Back to Basics program has supported me to re- ignite that spark.
It is a simple process of supporting our bodies in all the ways we know it needs. And being honest about what choices we have made in our lives.
It has worked for me, like nothing else.
I have been feeling some old feelings of life just being too much to deal with.
Deep feelings of devastation, its just too hard to go on.
I have lived with these feelings in my body for a long time. I have avoided these feelings by pushing them down, working hard so my bodys physical pain overrode my emotional pain.
This is all about my choice to give up what I knew was the only way to live. A way that is all about just being me, connected to a source of love and wisdom so beyond anything. It is hard to describe.
The ultimate giving up.
With support from Simple Living Global, I am understanding why I gave up and with self love and patience.
I am feeling these buried emotions and letting them go.
This is allowing me to remember this way of living, this way of being. It is awaking the purpose and passion for life that I had as a child.
Citizen Journalism here reporting in.
Out walking today up to the local supermarket. Young guy outside selling those homeless magazines. It is designed to stop them living on the streets and begging.
I have clocked this young man for some time and have been curious as he does not fit the usual look of the homeless guys who sell these magazines. The first thing that sticks out he is too young. Second thing is he is washed and clean and has very sparkly eyes.
Today I had to speak to him and find out more. He is 18 years old and just given up studying at college to look after his father who has kidney failure. With the eastern european background, he is expected to do this and what was clear was he have given up on life. In other words, his life. He told me he has no choice and this is the only way he can live his life now, selling and making some money during the daytime and then looking after his father. We talked about kidney disease and what the kidneys do and he said he has no idea and would like to learn more, but with no direction or where to go he feels helpless.
I have directed him to this website and the blog on Kidney.
As the author of the blog, he asked me what exactly do our kidneys do and then I began to share what I know and am aware of. He said it made sense and he agreed when I said your father is exhausted and I take it he has worked extremely hard with no true rest or sleep and he said correct. So here we have a case of how our choices in life have a greater impact than we might even consider.
If we choose not to take care of our body, there will come a time that it breaks down and then others may have to give up on their life to take care of us, as in this case.
My strong message as an elder in the community to him was do not give up on life and there is much that you can do even with the responsibility of looking after your father. I suggested he read the sleep blog and ensures he honours his body and checks his vitality levels, so he does not follow the patterns of his father with super long hours working and very little rest.
Gone are the days where I shut my mouth, mind my own business and make my life about me me me.
The world is suffering and starving of truth and some of us have heaps of wisdom, coming from our lived experience.
Better to share that than walk away and think it is not our problem.
I can relate to this blog as I had completely given up on life.
However once I started on the road of questioning my life and what is working and not working and letting go of ill behaviours, I have felt more at ease with myself and I’d say more in connection with the real me.
Once we re-connect to who we really are it takes a commitment to sustain this, regardless of what is going on around us or what we see or what others are doing. I have found that it takes a commitment to hold firm with what we know feels true for us, regardless of what others are saying.
I have some more work to do on this to commit to life in full, but I can certainly say that I am on my way.
The Conversation – 27 September 2018
https://theconversation.com/give-up-itis-when-people-just-give-up-and-die-103727
There is actually a term called – give-up-itis.
It was named during the Korean War of 1950 – 1953.
It’s described 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.
The article’s author – John Leach – visiting senior research fellow at University of Portsmouth has identified 5 stages to this dis-order:
Stage 1 – People withdraw socially. Their mood and motivation drop, but they are still able to think.
Stage 2 – Profound apathy or colossal inertia, which means that a person is unwilling to take action and has no interest in anything.
Stage 3 – Aboulia
A psychiatric term meaning – loss of willpower or an inability to act decisively.
At this stage a person with give-up-itis usually stops talking, washing and generally looking after themselves.
Stage 4 – Psychic Akenesia.
The person is now nearing the end. No longer feeling thirst, pain or hunger they often lose control of their bowels.
Stage 5 – The goal is the relinquishing of life and though it may look like the person has made a miraculous recovery with some goal orientated behaviours – it is false.
Many of these stages and behaviours are linked to a reduction in dopamine – an important neurotransmitter in the brain.
Leach also shares that give-up-itis often occurs in a traumatic situation, with death viewed as a way to have control over the situation.
So this is a real and very serious dis-order. Leach states that not much is known about it.
What if the questions posed in this blog by Simple Living Global holds a lot of the answers, if we were to seriously ask ourselves the questions?
What if this give-up-itis is an extreme form of Giving Up on Life?
What if we could actually stop ourselves from getting to the extreme, by contemplating these closing questions from Simple Living Global –
What if Giving up on Life is because we have a lack of Commitment to Life?
What if taking Responsibility and making a choice to Commit to Life is the answer to the Giving up on Life syndrome?
What if the Simple Living blog “Commitment to Life” has the answer to Giving up on Life?
https://simplelivingglobal.com/commitment-to-life-part-1/
What if this blog and this website have the answers?
Having a great conversation at the dinner table today, I was asking our guest a question about his take on Dementia as he lost both his parents to this illness.
He started with saying it is really awful to watch both your parents end up in care homes and die of Dementia. He is wondering if he will get it and he feels he needs to look at his lifestyle choices as he wants to be around his grandchildren for many more years to come. He knows he has to get fit and it is about movement. We need to keep moving. I had to agree as I know movement is really our behaviour.
His take was that his father had given up on life. He retired from work and refused to engage with the world or do anything. I said what if that checked out state and lack of movement meant he was heading down the road of ill mental health where he lost interest in life completely?
What if his lack of commitment to life just suddenly stopped with the age thing saying it’s time to retire, even though he could have continued working like many of us could until our last breath?
Who invented retirement and what is it programming us into?
What if research was carried out with those who had a solid working life then retired and got dementia?
Would this correlation tell us something about how we as humans need to keep moving, albeit at a different pace and quality but nevertheless work?
Is our retirement like a lifestyle sales pitch where we fall for the pictures in our head of this idyllic way of life with no job and no work to speak of but in truth our body was designed to work even if it is in a different way?
Think about it – all that lived experience. So much wisdom that could be expressed to the younger generations instead of in a care home or wherever our last stages of life are going to be.
Back to the dinner table. What I found interesting is that having chats like this hold meaning and purpose. This man left with a lot of questions to ponder on and even consider another way of living as he met others who are reflecting another way.
The Guardian – 10 September 2021
35% rise in calls about handing back dogs since lockdown restrictions lifted.
55% increase in emails to the same Dogs Trust charity on the same subject.
182% increase in traffic for “giving up your dog” pages on its website.
The chief executive, Owen Sharp stated that following a boom in pet ownership during the pandemic, which saw millions wanting dogs for companions, it is no surprise to his organisation that now they want to hand them back.
Circumstances change and puppies grow up into boisterous teenagers, many reconsider the place in their life for a pet says Sharp of Dogs Trust – a UK charity.
The boom for “pandemic puppies” led to shortages of pet foods in supermarkets. It led to skyrocketing prices, which then led to a black market for unethical hidden economy breeding and soaring dog thefts. See these links for more information:
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2020/oct/10/puppy-costs-buying-dog-covid
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2020/oct/18/dogs-of-woe-the-pull-of-a-pooch-in-covid-times
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/aug/08/dog-theft-law-gets-more-bite-with-new-pet-abduction-offence
A recent survey of 5,517 new puppy owners by researchers at the Royal Veterinary College, found some were less likely to seek credible breeders or even view their puppy in person before purchase and collection and paying over £2,000 for their new pet.
The study also found that pandemic puppy owners were more likely to have no previous experience of owning a dog.
There are 12.5 million dogs in the UK and we can assume these figures are correct from all dogs registered. What about those under the radar and the excess cross breeding for designer dogs and all those smuggled in from overseas? What is the real figure here?
Regardless of the charity and other experts in the field telling potential owners to consider the longer term consequences and how their lives many need to change to accommodate a pet dog as restrictions are lifted, most of us are not taking the Responsibility when it comes to making choices in life.
We can do what we want, when we want and if we want a dog to order – a specific looking and certain size, like our influencers or celebrities have on social media, then we find it because we can and no one or nothing can stop us. We make the demand and the suppliers are just there, they appear when we go seeking and bingo we get what we want.
Next – time up and we want our social life back and work is making us go in a few days and we are not that interested any longer in dog duties and all it entails. Add to that the puppy is now a grown dog and we are not liking the reflection it offers – in other words, it seems to have attitude and the behaviour is not up to what we want (bit like us), so best we take action, as it is triggering us and we do not like our reactions. So we search on the internet about how we can give up our puppies.
GIVING UP – where else in our life are we giving up?
Is it the overwhelm because we have lost our way in daily life and of course we blame everything and anything on to this virus, this pandemic and those lockdowns that made us give up?
Did we make irresponsible choices like staying up late and getting hooked to net flicking of movies or waking up late or not getting fully dressed for work meetings, as we know they don’t see everything on screen?
Did we start drinking alcohol or even gone down the drugs road, as we could not bear the space we were told to stay in and move around in because it was bringing up stuff for us and we are used to having distractions in our life, as that is our self medication?
Did we give up in life as no one bothers to be honest these days, we all fake it and pretend life is great when it really and truly sucks, we are jealous of others or in constant comparison of what others are saying and doing and what they got?
Did we give up on life because we feel dis-connected and that void has made us feel lonely and yet we seemingly have so much to be grateful for in the material world and we opt for the puppy?
Did we do what we are good at and that is receive the best and go for what others may want because the money is there to spend? Right? So we get our minions on the case and order our designer doggie, certain size, eyes, tongue hanging out at certain angle and ears exactly how the picture we found. Boom order on its way. Delivery we want yesterday, as we are not one that waits or hangs around as money talks in our world.
The sentient being super cute arrives and comes with complications as it was stolen and like a human it seems to have anxiety and is rather nervous and un-settled. The anxiety is making it pee a lot anywhere and everywhere and now it becomes a nuisance overnight in our plush designer home, which has a focus of daily uploads to social media followers. We cannot have this puppy peeing all over the place and the poo smells and we do not recall signing up for that.
We may be laughing or we can relate to this. We may not want to admit but there is an element of truth for those that are open and honest about what is going on in our world.
Another real life scenario – the kids are saying we missed out on holidays and stuck indoors, we want a family dog and we give in and get one and then the responsibility that was promised and the rota on the wall that everyone was going to follow is no where to be seen and this cute little thing is worse than having a terrible 2 or tantrum 3 year old, into anything and everything and adding to the already chaotic household that it is.
We give up and go to search “giving up your dog”.
Back to the news story. We have created this new pandemic puppy industry and now we want out and expect others to take over and as there is no law governing us and no moral compass to speak of and no Responsibility to suck it up and learn from our choices, so we just give up until the next ill choice we make and we keep going around and around until one day we realise that we need to consider the bigger picture and not just go into reaction and buy a dog as if it is a commodity, something we can acquire and discard as and when it suits us. This is a living species that has a lot of human qualities and deserves to be treated with the utmost decency and respect at all times.
And finally, it comes as no surprise that we have billboards saying “A dog is for life”.
We need to be reminded of our Responsibility because we clearly fail in this area.