Friday, August 15, 2014

When a Rich and Famous Person Ends Their Life

Yesterday evening we learned of the alleged suicide of the great comedian Robin Williams.

Tragic.

Robin Williams was considered by many to be one of the greatest comedic actors of all time.  His career spanned most of my adult life, first as Mork (Mork and Mindy, 1978), then through many great roles.

But Williams' greatest gift to us may indeed be in his death.

Robin Williams had everything that most Americans, and most people in the world, find appealing.  Williams was rich, famous, handsome.  He had the resources to travel anywhere and do anything he wanted.  He could buy any car, any clothes, any house he wanted.  He had achieved the American Dream, big time.

So, why did someone so wealthy and famous end his own life?  Why do Heath Ledger, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and a long list of others (Google it) either deliberately, or effectively, choose to end their "wonderful" lives?

Maybe Williams and others are telling us something.  Maybe they are the BEST illustration that materialism never fulfills.  Maybe they are shouting at us in their pain.  Maybe they are writing in BOLD letters, this material life, this stuff, is NOT what we were made for.  Stuff will always disappoint us.

The life is in the spirit.  Our spirit, our relationship with the G^d of the universe can fulfill us despite a total absence of material possessions.

So what do you make of it?

1 comment:

  1. I think Robin Williams was raised in wealth with a father who was so busy making money he wasn't home much. I'm not sure Robin worked because of wealth, since that's all he knew anyway, and he knew the downside to it. But I do think he was a tormented person, with mental illness and the desire for self cure and then finding out he had Parkinson's...he gave up. I know he indicated some that he was a Christian, and of course no one knows for sure but himself and God...and I guess we'll know someday if we see him! But I really don't think he was about having it all. I think he felt pretty much like he didn't.

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