Suicide
It is almost always a mistake to commit suicide. Yet, many people exaggerate the negative consequences of suicide in the afterlife because they are afraid someone might kill themself if they were not afraid of being punished for it. However, exaggerating the negative consequences of suicide is also a mistake because it increases the suffering of those who are grieving for suicide victims, and it causes confusion to suicide victims when they cross over.
Someone who is contemplating suicide needs to understand that suicide won't solve anything because they are an immortal spirit and it is impossible to really kill yourself. Furthermore, you can't escape the consequences of your actions by killing yourself.
Someone who is grieving for a suicide victim, or a suicide victim who has just crossed over, needs to understand there is no special punishment assigned to suicide victims in the afterlife.
In the vast majority of cases, people kill themselves due to abnormal brain chemistry. This was the subject of a radio program on NPR. The description of the program on the NPR web site explains....
What drives people to suicide? NPR's Michelle Trudeau reports that in laboratories around the country, neuro-scientists are trying to find out. They're studying the brains of people who've committed suicide and comparing them with people who died suddenly. People who commit suicide appear to have different brain chemistry than others.
http://www.npr.org/programs/death/980429.death.html
However, once the spirit is no longer under the influence of the physical body, they come back to their right mind. I've seen mediums bring through spirits who committed suicide on the John Edward show, and in Spiritualist churches, and I've even brought through one myself in a mediumship class and it is clear that no one is automatically condemned to the lowest spheres in the afterlife solely because they killed themself. There is no special punishment in the afterlife for people who commit suicide.
Spirits who need healing or other types of help when they cross over get the help they need in the afterlife.
If their suicide causes problems for others, they will regret it, just like someone with cancer might regret the burden their illness caused other family members. Even if the suicide was due to mental illness or for, example, a brain tumor and there are no karmic consequences, they still might regret the suffering of their loved ones still on earth.
If you kill yourself to avoid karma (the consequences of your actions) that is a mistake because you can't hide from your karma. It will catch up with you in this life or the next. If you kill yourself to avoid regret over your actions in life you will still regret those actions in the afterlife.
For this reason people who learn about the afterlife are less likely to commit suicide. It was found that people who have a near death experience are less likely to commit suicide. In Lessons from the Light, Kenneth Ring and Evelyn Elsaesser discuss research showing that just learning about Near Death Experiences deters suicide.Ring People who learn about the afterlife and the fact that suicide doesn't help in any way, are less likely to commit suicide.
The following excerpt, from a description by Sandra Rogers of her near-death experience, shows that victims of suicide are greeted with love in the afterlife but also that suicide does not let them evade their problems.
I came into the presence of a brilliant, wonderfully warm and loving Light. While I was in the presence of this Light I was shown a review of my life and all the events that brought me to that point.
...
I was given the choice of remaining with the light, provided I return later to the physical world and experience all that brought me to the point of shooting myself, or I could return now and pick up my life where it was. I was told that I would eventually have the family and love I so desperately yearned for.
John Edward and George Anderson two highly respected mediums both say no one is punished in the afterlife.
John Edward in his book "One Last Time" in the chapter "Sneaking Peaks" has this to say about suicide:
We are not punished on the Other Side, except by ourselves. We ask ourselves why we did what we did, and seek to improve.
An example is suicide. I've had people come through who have ended their own lives, and in some cases they have given me the feeling that they have a spiritual type of therapy going on around them. Even though they are all right - they are not in any kind of limbo, as some might believe - they are trying to understand why they did what they did, and using it in learning their spiritual lessons. There is also a sense of sorrow for the people they left behind. This is not to say such feelings are unique to those who have committed suicide. I have had many spirits who passed from the physical state in "natural" ways, or in accidents, come through conveying to me that they are working on those same kinds of lessons. What matters is how they spent their time on this side. Someone with minimal human success - spiritual, not material, of course-will have to work on his lessons on the Other Side. Our physical lives are analogous to formal schooling. You're better off doing well in school - you'll have a leg up when you graduate - but even if you don't do well, or you drop out (suicide), you can still become a success story. It depends on what you do after you leave school."
George Anderson's "Lessons from the Light" in chapter six: "Suicide" has this to say
The issue of passing by one's own hand is a difficult one for us to understand, mainly because what the Other Side has told me with regard to suicide flies in the face of just about every religion. I am not sure why it would, though, because the hereafter's way makes perfect sense. As I stated before, nothing is beyond the understanding and wisdom of the Infinite Light, and no one is punished in the hereafter for their actions on the earth - they are simply shown the impact of their actions on those who love them, and the soul must take it from there.
Because of the volume of mail sent to me on this subject with the same question, which comes up again and again, I will state simply and emphatically that according to the souls in the hereafter, no one who commits suicide goes to Hell. I can say this without reservation because, according to the hereafter, there is no "Hell" as we have been conditioned to think about it. The wisdom of the Infinite Light understands the reasons behind every action taken against oneself or another. The souls in the hereafter who have passed by their own hand tell me time and time again that they were not in the correct frame of mind to consider the gravity of their actions. This in itself is a form of mental illness, which the hereafter would try to reconcile - not punish.
Notes
Ring) Here is an excerpt from Lessons from the Light by Kenneth Ring and Evelyn Elsaesser which explains how knowledge of the afterlife deters suicide.
As far as I know, the first clinician to make use of NDE material in this context was a New York psychologist named John McDonagh. In 1979, he presented a paper at a psychological convention that described his success with several suicidal patients using a device he called "NDE bibliotherapy." His "technique" was actually little more than having his patients read some relevant passages from Raymond Moody's book, Reflections on Life after Life, after which the therapist and his patient would discuss its implicatins for the latter's own situation. McDonagh reports that such an approach was generally quite successful not only in reducing suicidal thoughts but also in preventing the deed altogether.
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Since McDonagh's pioneering efforts, other clinicians knowledgeable about the NDE who have had the opportunity to counsel suicidal patients have also reported similar success. Perhaps the most notable of these therapists is Bruce Greyson, a psychiatrist now at the University of Virginia, whose specialty as a clinician has been suicidology. He is also the author of a classic paper on NDEs and suicide which the specialist may wish to consult for tis therapeutic implications. (14)
Quite apart form the clinicians who have developed this form of what we migh call "NDE-assisted therapy," I can draw upon my own personal experience here to provide additional evidence of how the NDE has helped to deter suicide. The following case ...
