Yulia Voznesenskaya: the tools of our ministry are the word and the heart
Every year on September 10, the World Health Organization (WHO), with the support of the International Association for Suicide Prevention, celebrates World Suicide Prevention Day . The purpose of this day is to encourage suicide prevention efforts around the world. Today, on the day of the fight against suicide, the famous writer Yulia Voznesenskaya , one of the moderators of the suicide prevention website “Pobedish.ru” (https://www.pobedish.ru/), spoke about this little-known side of her work.
– YULIA NIKOLAEVNA, TODAY, ON THE DAY OF THE FIGHT AGAINST SUICIDE IN THE WORLD, YOU KINDLY AGREED TO TALK ABOUT THIS EXTREMELY SERIOUS TOPIC. HOWEVER, MOST OF YOUR READERS AND ADORS DO NOT KNOW ABOUT YOUR SERVICE IN THIS FIELD.
– Thank you very much, Irina, for this word – SERVICE. In terms of literature, I would be embarrassed to try it on, but in terms of the anti-suicide forum “You Will Win,” I try it on and accept it. Volunteer work on the forum is precisely service.
Do you remember how J. Salinger's character Holden Caulfield defined his calling in the novel The Catcher in the Rye? The teenager says to his little sister: “You see, I imagined how little children play in the evening in a huge field, in the rye. Thousands of kids and around - not a soul, not a single adult except me. And I’m standing on the very edge of the cliff above the abyss, you know? And my job is to catch the kids so they don’t fall into the abyss.” Only we don’t have an abyss, but a terrible marshy swamp and our “children”, and most of the site’s visitors are young people, have already stepped into this swamp and are already beginning to drown in it. And we have no lifebuoys, no ropes, no rafts, no hooks - just one word with which you need to immediately go to the person who contacted the site, to his “guest room” (this is something like a reception area, where you can post your request for help) or on the forum. Well, and the heart, of course, without a heart there is nothing to do on our site. Yes, that’s how I would define the tools of this ministry – “the word and the heart.”
– PLEASE TELL US ABOUT YOUR TEAM AND HOW THIS MINISTRY APPEARED, WHAT IT IS CONNECTED WITH?
– The anti-suicide website “Pobedish.ru” is part of the Internet project “Perejit.ru” (https://www.perejit.ru/), founded in 2006 by Dmitry Gennadievich Semenik, which answers the question “How to survive the passing of a loved one?” The Pobedish.ru website was opened two years later, in 2008, because the number of potential suicides who turned to Perezhit.ru for help was terrifyingly high. Isn’t it scary that the site traffic is about 6,500 people a day? I consider it a credit to our team of volunteers (among the 50 people there are psychologists, psychiatrists, and priests) that more than 20 thousand people said that the site saved them from suicide. The site contains tens of thousands of positive reviews about his work. Three books have been published based on the site’s materials - these are the only anti-suicide books that actually exist and help in Russia, addressed to suicides (and not, excuse me, rubbish written by pseudo-specialists for psychologists). By the way, representatives of the site are among the Rospotrebnadzor experts who analyze sites for suicide risk. Project activists taught suicide prevention to university teachers in Belarus and officers in Russia.
– HOW DID YOU BE AMONG THE VOLUNTEERS OF AN ANTI-SUICIDE SITE?
– It all started when we met in Moscow “Dr. Mishenka” - psychologist Mikhail Igorevich Khasminsky - and his colleague Dr. Inna Mirzoeva. He worked as a psychologist at the Oncological Center. Blokhin and hospice for children with cancer. They asked me to write “a few books” for children with cancer. Naturally, I couldn’t refuse. We met at a float restaurant on the shore of the Dzhamgarovsky pond, and my dear doctors put two plastic bags of my books in front of me: “Here, write them down!” Of course, it would probably be possible to just write to everyone, but Dr. Mishenka immediately started talking about sick children, and I began to write to everyone individually, setting out to please and cheer up each sick child. I don’t remember how long we did this, but it was a long time. I wrote, my psychologists read and suggested. Here Dr. Mishenka stated that these inscriptions, like books, would have a “therapeutic effect.” “These are health pills!” – he said and immediately invited me to work as a volunteer on the website project “Survive. ru”, recently founded by Dmitry Semenik to help people experiencing a mental crisis. The same project also includes the website “Pobedish.ru”, which was later spun off from it as a purely anti-suicidal site.
– HAVE YOU PERSONALLY OR ANY OF YOUR RELATIVES AND FRIENDS HAVE EVER HAD THOUGHTS ABOUT SUICIDE?
- Thank God no. I’ve never even heard of one of my distant relatives or ancestors ending up on this terrible edge of life. But, excluding a small number of liberal atheists, all relatives and ancestors were Orthodox, and it is well known that among believers the percentage of suicides is extremely low . You could even say that these are mentally ill people, and not just people experiencing some kind of mental crisis.
– WHAT ELSE DO YOU THINK THE STATE, CHURCH AND NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS CAN DO IN ADDITION TO THE SERVICE THAT YOU AND OTHER VOLUNTEERS DO ON THE WEBSITE “POBEDISH.RU”?
– First of all, I think it is necessary to openly and clearly identify the problem, and not hush it up according to the old Soviet habit . Moreover, one should not fight against a single site of such a scale that exposes the painful problem of suicide. And this happens: from time to time someone “at the top” suddenly discovers a site that fights suicidal tendencies in society, primarily among young people, and by some strange tendency tries to eliminate not evil, but those who fight against it evil. It's as if the question will disappear if you close it! Don't flatter yourself, it won't disappear. No one should “fight” evil by eliminating active and dedicated volunteers who fight it. We must frankly admit that suicide exists in our country, that it is a great social evil and we need to fight it all together and at all levels.
– WHAT ARE THE DISADVANTAGES OF THIS SITE?
- Honestly? I don't see any disadvantages. We have practically no failures in our work. Of course, there are difficulties, and first of all this is the constant shortage of volunteers . You must understand, Irina, that working on the site is very difficult, many people work literally to the point of exhaustion, “to burn out,” in the professional language of psychologists. From time to time you have to take time off to recover. Well, it’s become easier for me lately: I get sick and from time to time I go to the hospital - there I rest. And many do the same. After all, we have people with disabilities and simply very sick people, including cancer patients. And some can’t stand it and leave the “distance” of volunteer help. Well, this is in the order of things, and thanks to them for what they managed to do.
– DOES YOUR WEBSITE HAVE POTENTIAL?
– As for the potential, the site is constantly developing and changing; it is a very lively and creative process. Again, “honestly, honestly,” I admit to you that I consider my work for “Pobedish” to be almost more important than my creativity. In any case, the advice does not gnaw at me if, for health reasons or mood, I do not work on books. But I probably just can’t afford to miss a day and not go to the site. Conscience does not dictate. I’m sick, and I need to hurry to do good.
Interviewed by Irina Akhundova
Reference
According to WHO, the total number of deaths from suicide is now approaching one million per year. The trends are such that by 2021 the number of suicides may increase by one and a half times. Suicide is a global and tragic global health problem. According to statistics, half of the violent deaths in the world are due to suicide, which kills as many people in the world as from wars and violent murders combined.
Pravoslavie.ru
GET UP, LAZY! Hegumen Tikhon (Borisov)
Previously, peasants, nobles, merchants, and townspeople came to the Optina steps. Today - teachers, athletes, professors, politicians and businessmen.
Previously - frock coats, caftans and sundresses. Now - jeans, down jackets and other modern clothes...
Time varies. The pace is different. Fashions are different. People are different.
The passions are the same. The main diseases of the soul are the same. And the Lord is One and the Same!
Once upon a time, Optina was called “the hottest fire around which all of Russia warmed itself.” Now, in these times, we are only trying together to rekindle the extinct embers of this once-blazing fire. We live in difficult, complex, paradoxical times.
The world is trying to kill man. He wants to make it not come true, not take place, not germinate for Eternity. The world wants to prevent man from meeting God. Each of us knows how difficult it is to be alive. How hard it is to be real. How difficult it is to dive into the depths of life, into its truth, into its enduring truth. And how necessary are the warm prayers of the saints for us!
The spear of time pierces our lives, and we now celebrate the memory of the one whose soul is already beyond our earthly vanity and routine. We look at his humble shining face on the icon, and his eyes warm us with the fire of Eternity. We venerate his fragrant relics, and the inspired wind of grace revives our dull, despondent hearts. We ask for his intercession, and it comes faster than supersonic speed... Because the Monk Ambrose is here, nearby and he is always ready to help us.
It’s scary to talk about a saint... It’s like a blind person talking about the beauty of the rising sun or the solemn quiet decoration of an autumn forest. Or how can a deaf person try to understand the harmony of a Bach symphony or hear the leisurely, mysterious whisper of sea waves... St. Ambrose is an incomprehensible depth for us! Incomprehensible height and mystery!
Here, near his hermitage hut, the penitents coughed up sin like blood after a fight. Here the extinct embers of human conscience swelled and flared up. Here a terrible splinter of unbelief, emptiness, and fear was removed from the heart. Just as a prospector washes mountains of earth with a sieve to find small grains of gold, so Elder Ambrose, through a sieve of prayer, compassion, and sympathy, found ingots of love, goodness, and light in endless tons of rotting garbage of human hearts and destinies.
A 20th century philosopher once said that “solitude is a luxury of the rich.” He meant that a person is always in a bustle, in a hurry, in some kind of business, and to be alone, to concentrate, to think is a great luxury. Not everyone can afford this... And although the Monk Ambrose was a real spiritual rich man, he did not have this luxury of solitude. “Just as I was born among people, so I live among people,” the elder said, jokingly, about himself.
He lived in public. He lived for people. For many years, a whole ocean of human grief swayed, sighed and cried around him. People rarely go to the elder to report their joy. They bring pain, grief, bewilderment, suffering, and sorrow to the elder. For a peasant woman, grief is always dying geese. For the great Dostoevsky, who timidly entered the threshold of old age, this is the death of his little son. “He was equally open to everyone,” noted K. Leontyev, “and in every person he foresaw the image and likeness of God!”
Each of us knows how difficult it is to console a person in his grief, how difficult it is to find the right words, how difficult it is to caress him with sincere sympathy. Elder Ambrose understood very well that comforting a grieving person does not mean trying to abolish his suffering. A terminal illness or the loss of a loved one cannot be undone. To console is to help suffer! To teach a person to bear suffering without grumbling, accepting it as if from the hand of the Supreme Providence!
He taught us to live “like a wheel turning—as soon as one point touches the ground, the rest tends upward!” He compared the world to an annoying bazaar. A man is a peasant riding his little horse through this market. Everyone around is shouting, pushing their goods, trying to drag you into some kind of deals and stories. And the peasant does not pay attention to this roaring, ringing bustle, spurs on his horse, and so little by little he rides through all these traps, deceptions and temptations of the heaving sea of life.
To the mother whose son, who worked at the telegraph and often brought telegrams to the monk, died, the elder affectionately said: “Well, what? Was your telegram cut off? A person who complained of a sore hand was reminded that he had once beaten his mother.
One day, novice Matthew, who was suffering from wine drinking, ran out, as he later recalled, in “Adam’s suit,” that is, completely naked, straight to the carriage in which the elder was riding. “Well,” said Abba with love and condescension, “the grace of God has not yet departed from him!”
The elder joked, beat someone with a stick, affectionately called someone “stupid,” and used proverbs and jokes. But no one, not even the cell attendants, knew that behind all this there were sleepless nights, tears and prayer for the whole world! He turned his small cell into a doctor’s office, in which he healed not fractures and bruises, not headaches or heartburn, not diarrhea or scrofula. He healed terrible, stinking wounds and ulcers of the human soul, monitored the spiritual cardiogram, straightened terrible heart dislocations and fractures that prevented a person from living and praying normally.
Elder Ambrose, like a wise architriclin, skillfully distributed the spiritual wine of Optina grace. Like a good, skilled potter, from the dead, inconspicuous clay of the human soul, he sculpted, reverently and carefully, a beautiful, unique vessel that was to be filled with Divine grace.
Reverend Ambrose is a whole era. Several generations of Christians grew up, raised on his letters, his teachings, and most importantly, on his prayers! As if from Eternity, from the luminous heavenly abodes, we hear his wonderful words, which have already become symbolic and iconic: “To live, don’t bother! Don’t judge anyone, don’t annoy anyone, and my respect to everyone!”
Thousands and thousands of people have been coming to Optina for many years to bask spiritually at the relics of the saint. He teaches us to live by Christ! Breathe in prayer! Strive for Eternity! Carry your earthly life cross without complaint. Teaches us to see heaven in the soul of our neighbor. The Monk Ambrose helps us to live deeply and freely, joyfully and with inspiration, our difficult, unadorned, sorrowful life with its incurable illnesses, with its “torn telegrams”, with the pain of losses, with the misunderstanding of loved ones, with the malice of the world around us... And there, in this daily routine, to bring light, peace, humility, meaning and love into the ringing emptiness of everyday life!
One day, leaning on a stick, Elder Ambrose walked from the monastery to the monastery. Suddenly he unexpectedly saw such a sad picture: a loaded cart, a dead horse lying nearby and a crying peasant. The old man walked around the horse three times, took a twig, whipped the beast and shouted: “Get up, lazy one!” And the horse obediently rose to its feet.
So our soul, relaxed and lazy, half-dead, loaded with many sins, dressed in “non-marital clothing,” lies at the crossroads of a vain, busy world. The Lord, with twigs of difficulties, sorrows and temptations, spurs and encourages us and sends saints, such as the Monk Ambrose, to help.
Even today we hear his encouraging, sober fatherly words, addressed with love to the soul of each of us: “Get up, lazy one!”
https://www.optina.ru/sermon/pt102/
