The genesis of any type of violence begins in the "mind." Therefore, to fully understand why anyone would murder someone they love and then commit suicide, it is important to first understand the anatomy and functions of the soul.
Anatomy, functions of the soul
The mind, the intellect and the memory are the three faculties of the soul.
The mind is the thinking faculty of the soul where all thoughts are created or generated. The mind imagines, thinks and formulates ideas on the basis of all emotions, desires and sensations. The mind projects instant thoughts, relives past experiences and even anticipates the future. The intellect is the faculty of the soul used to assess thoughts. This is the faculty of understanding, judgment and decision-making. It is the intellect that remembers, discriminates, judges and exercises its strength in the form of "will power." In the intellect resides the power to reason and it is the seat of your conscience. The memory is the faculty that records all the past actions and experiences of the soul. It takes the form of habits, personality traits, beliefs, values and instincts.
Murder-suicide victims normal
Generally, people who commit such gruesome acts are very normal and ought not to be categorised as psychopathic in nature. They come from among the rich as well as the poor, the educated as well as the uneducated, and they straddle all religions, class, colour or caste.
The root cause of these actions stems mainly from one of the five evil spirits of anger, greed, ego, lust and attachment.
Anger makes reasoning power comatose
When someone's love or affection has being rejected after years of marital bliss or a long intimate relationship, especially in preference for another, the mind feeds the bruised ego with thoughts of hate and revenge that generate anger that leads to hurt and depression. Relationships turn sour mainly because of infidelity, flirting, jealousy, greed, or some sort of selfish motivation by one or another party. Whatever is the cause, it leads initially to anger and the ego of arrogance.
When anger is nurtured, the reasoning power of mind and intellect becomes dormant or comatose, rendering the conscience dead. When the conscience goes dead, the power of discrimination of the intellect goes into temporary hibernation. Some refer to this stage as one with a "split personality." It is at this point that anger turns into raging jealousy, hate or an unrepentant ego, causing the most heinous crimes to be committed, even to our most loved ones. When the act is being committed, the perpetrator does not have the power of reasoning as the intellect is impotent and cannot discern the consequence of the act.
Murder-suicide act was premeditated
Usually, the one who commits the act is always hopeful that he would regain his lover. However, during the period of hurt and depression, he cannot bear the reality that his loved one is in the arms of another and this is when he would premeditate the demise of his loved one or the third person. During this period of premeditation, nothing matters anymore and he retreats from society internally and externally.
At work, he would withdraw from everyone and would be seen in deep contemplation as though mummified. If there were children involved, he would pretend as though all is well so as not to hurt them. However, his facial countenance betrays his inner feelings. He is hurt and depressed and cannot hide his feelings. Because of this, he plans his exit through the suicide route. He becomes careless and leaves notable evidence that would only be discovered after the fact and act. Many times he would prepare a suicide note so his children would understand his feelings and would not lay blame or hate him.
Suicide, a means to end the agony
Suicide is the act of one whose "psyche" is confused and who has lost the ability to discriminate between right and wrong, or lacks the strength to judge by not having clarity of thought, or is empty of tolerance and hence becomes devoid of the power to face situations. Suicide is a self-inflicted premeditated demise of one's life when the soul has lost the power to face situations, either for loss of name, fame, shame, sickness or indebtedness to society. Therefore it s important to understand the spiritual aspects of life as well as know that anger, greed, ego, lust and attachment are your own worst enemy. The root cause of these gruesome acts is non-physical and hence the solutions must be spiritual in essence.
�2 ?Yogi Khem Jokhoo is a physicist/engineer/ yogi by profession. In the last 16 years, he has done extensive studies in moral values and spirituality. He is a student and teacher of yoga and meditation. He also teaches positive thinking, stress-free living and
self-management leadership