Why I am Angry and Depressed about Kate Spade’s Suicide

For some reason this particular suicide has me extremely upset and actually feeling slightly manic. Maybe it’s because, like her sister Reta, I was my beautiful and super-intelligent sister Kaly’s confidant— “C’mon Jo, do you really think I’m gonna throw myself off the balcony?” (She didn’t actually do that but might as well have, because it was all downhill from that point.)

Maybe it’s because I was always the class clown, life of every party, and star of every performance, but had to be treated for manic depression for a few years after losing two of my sisters, one right after the other. It’s a very strange adjustment to make when you’ve built up this go-lucky image of yourself for so long. Did anyone think it was weird that at the age of 30 I never took off my rollerblades? Was skating ramps with people half my age, and running in and out of dance classes all day in Manhattan? All that physical activity sure helped hide how I was really feeling. But looking back now, I wasn’t really fooling anyone.

Maybe it’s because I also have a 13 year old daughter, and I had to get through some really tough emotional states when she was younger. I got through them because I know how devastating it is to be left behind by someone so close to you. I knew I could never do that to her. And I knew I couldn’t be selfish enough to allow my mother to bury a third daughter. That wasn’t going to happen.

But mental disease is such a devastating thing! How is it possible that with all our technology and innovation we haven’t solved this yet? Over the last few years high-tech investors have poured millions* into meditation and happiness apps**, so why are the depression and suicide statistics still growing steadily?

I think it has to do with the fact that all these mindfulness and happiness solutions have one major flaw. They help people go inward, calm the nervous system, and probably also activate some feel-good endorphins along the way — pretty much the way rollerblading through Manhattan every day kept me functioning for many years. But at some point I had to crash. I was bound to crash. I had some really big things inside to deal with that I was running away from and I was basically a ticking time bomb. The person closest to me, who I always got through everything with, was not around to chat. She dropped out of the race at age 23. My big sister left me to continue on my own.

So what did I do? I continued surviving the way people do. I got help, was medicated for a few years, and all those systems that society has in place really did help me get through a very difficult stage in my life. These systems allow us to function, to get through the days, weeks, and months, but they don’t really solve the root of the problem. The root of the problem is that we are mainly focused on filling ourselves, and this does not give us real pleasure. It’s no wonder that someone like Kate Spade who had achieved the highest level of success in life would lose hope after years of frustration of not feeling genuinely fulfilled, even after excelling at everything that society prescribes.

I eventually discovered many years later that the only way to really fill that empty place inside is by asking the right question: What is the meaning of my life? We actually avoid this question for as long as possible because it degrades us, causes us to feel depressed and makes us lose our will to live. Yet when I finally reached a point where I was tired of groping around in the dark on my own for answers, I was very lucky to find the most genuine and precise answer to this question.

So coming back to the flaw in all this mindfulness and meditation — it’s not a technical flaw in the design of these apps — it’s a flaw in our understanding of human nature. In our understanding of human evolution and how we are supposed to be using our advanced powers in this day and age in a far more sophisticated way than simply amplifying our inner contemplation.

The key to our true happiness is in enhancing human connection, in improving how we interact with one another. Activating the human wiring at the core of our humanity is the key to solving all our problems.

Unfortunately, we are all too distracted by smartphones, gadgets and apps to focus on what’s really important — understanding that we are all in this together and that we all need each other to advance to the next stage of our evolution. As long as we keep filling ourselves with the wrong answer to this question — more money and things — we will continue to experience suffering both on an individual and collective basis.

I’m actually not into things like fashion and have never heard of Kate Spade until today, but I have that familiar feeling again. I feel like we lost a sister — an incredible and amazingly talented sister. Someone who put her whole heart and soul into lifting everyone else up. The best way we can respect her passing is to start asking the right questions. So if you are suffering or know anyone who is having a hard time please ask this question: What is the meaning of my life? And the answers will come.

*  “In the past year or so, investors have backed more than 20 startups developing apps and tools aimed at promoting mindfulness, happiness and other desirable mental states. To date, these companies have raised more than $150 million, according to Crunchbase data. Several of the largest rounds have been in recent months, with the vast majority of funding going to California-based startups.”

**  In 2015 the meditation and mindfulness industry raked in nearly $1 billion, according to research by IBISWorld, which breaks out the category from the alternative health care sector. But even that doesn’t count the revenue from the nearly 1000 mindfulness apps now available, according to Sensor Tower (top app Headspace recently raised $30 million and has been downloaded 6 million times), or the burgeoning category of wearable gadgets designed to help people Zen out (the popular Muse connected headband measures brain activity during meditation for $299). This year 22% of employers will offer mindfulness training — typically priced between $500 and $10,000 for large-group sessions — a percentage that could double in 2017, according to a forthcoming survey by Fidelity Investments and the National Business Group on Health. The non-profit Search Inside Yourself Leadership Institute, a mindfulness training program incubated at Google, grew revenue more than 50% last year by offering two-day workshops (up to $35,000 for 50 people) to dozens of other Fortune 500 companies, including Ford (F, +0.26%) and American Express (AXP, +1.21%).