Constantine

Last night my brother and I watched the movie Constantine. I've wanted to see it for a while. Last time I tried I ended up making out and missed pretty much all but the first five minutes. Anyway, I went in expecting it to be pretty dark and scary (it was dark, and had a few scary parts) but I really enjoyed it.

Just as an overview, it's about Keanu Reeves who is an exorcist, and he comes across demons and sends them to hell as a daily routine. He bumps into Rachel Weiz who's sister just committed suicide and was sent to hell. They have to team up and save the world from Satan's son and the angel Gabriel (who is played by the White Witch from Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe) who are plotting to destroy the world, although Gabriel is hoping the influx of evil will bring out greater good in everyone. Anyway, there are lots of views of demons and hell and stuff like that, so it's fairly intense.

In the past I've been quite terrified of demons and hell-like creatures, and I thought I wouldn't want to watch it on a movie, but watching it did something that I think was good for me. I'll take this chance to go over some personal history.

I developed severe insomnia for quite some time because I was so terrified of sleeping, I always dreamed of being sent to hell. I found it was easier to just not sleep. I felt very haunted by hell and demons and ghosts and it was something that I had to war with on a daily level. Dealing with that sort of thing can make someone go crazy. I never have actually seen anything real, but my mind could create some amazing life-like comparisons, especially after one of my best friends died, I felt like he was staring at me whenever I went to sleep, and sleeping became an impossible task.

I viewed hell as being completely surrounded by nothing, floating through a world of stars where you have no control over anything and were so lonely that that was the only emotion you could actually feel and you would have been willing to die just so that you could feel something again. I remember going nearly a week without sleep, trying to close my eyes but the energy of fear taking over and all I could do was watch my room get darker and darker, and then lighter and lighter, being so petrified from the fear that I couldn't get up until it became light outside. After a while I learned I could only sleep when it was day time, that was when memories wouldn't haunt me and I could cope with things better. Even if I woke up in a cold sweat, at least I could immediately see everything that was around me. As soon as light would reach through my window I would fade from being so exhausted almost immediately, but I always had nightmares. A lot of them involved death or being raped or wars or the people I loved being murdered in some horrible way that I was responsible for.

Even in day time I was scared always that I was going to die. Whenever I got in a car I would always feel "Today, you are going to die." I had to make sure I told my daughter how much I loved her because I was scared I wouldn't see her again. I knew I was going to be taken at some point, and I was waiting for it everyday. This lasted for months, even a couple years. I developed anxiety over everything, over being seen by anyone I had known before because I felt they could see the differences painted on my face. They would recognize how much I had changed and how much I deserved it. I started isolating myself. I searched for ways to get away from it, to run from everything, from everyone who could see what was going on. I couldn't be here, I wasn't me anymore, I was something else, someone who couldn't deal with any of it. I was terrified that I was the worst parent in the world, and I wanted to leave, to be away from my daughter before I ruined her life like I had ruined mine. I tried numbing the pain, and that worked for a while. I just let go of the memories, of the thoughts, of the beliefs and then I didn't have to deal with the fear, but the insomnia still drove me crazy.

Finally, I found a way to cope with the lack of sleep, frightful nightmares and being terrified of ghosts and my impending death, and that was by accepting it. I came to grips with my place in hell, I've more or less accepted that I deserve to be in there and I should just make the best of it. I admitted I was the worst person in the world, that no one could ever be worse than I was and that I deserved to be in hell.

Once I was willing to accept that I was going to be burned in hell eternally everything changed. It was facing a fear, facing the most terrifying thing ever. I was going to live and die a horribly painful death and then I was going to be alone forever. That was my fate and I knew it. I accepted it, I was able to actually find peace with it. The nightmares didn't end. The insomnia didn't end, but it didn't hold the terror that it had before. After I accepted it I was able to joke about it. Then I became nonchalant. Then I became disrespectful. Then I just didn't give a damn anymore.

That was when I found hope. I talked to someone I trusted a great deal and they told me I had a small amount of hope. They still doubted I would survive anything, although they didn't know anything of what I had already gone through, but they just reminded me that there was a little bit of hope out there. That alone was able to end the nightmares and the insomnia because I had given up myself for loss for so long.

Watching this movie brought back only the memories of the terror, but not the terror itself. It reminded me that there are angels and demons out there. It reminded me to respect the reality of those things. It also reminded me that our fate isn't always doomed because we've done something wrong, and that even if no one believes we could ever do something right or fix what we've broken it's still possible if we believe it is. That was what this movie reminded me. It was a great and horrible movie. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone unless they have experienced their own hell and know what it was like to come back. That's when it's a movie worth watching.