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There is a bonus in tragedies of such magnitude. You realize that there is no further to go down, and that you have two choices. You can stay at the bottom and get used to the agonizing paralysis of those depths, and use any means–drugs, alcohol–to dull the lucid pain for which you are unable to find any relief within yourself. Or you can decide to rise to the surface again, and begin living once more. This last decision requires a conscious effort, for it is the active choice, and it can only succeed if you truly face your problems directly. It needs perseverance and action to follow it up, and it means change. Once you return to the surface you are as new, you have grown and have left down there your old self like a discarded and useless cocoon; and you have discovered that you can fly. In Ema’s death I had found the key to solve the riddle. Only in changing my attitude to it, and in giving my life a new purpose, could I balance the waste and make sense.
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