Despair

Despair is characterized by lack of hope and by a sense of waiting for hope to return. In present day Western society, despair is commonly suppressed or at least a (usually successful) attempt is made to hide its existence from others. This is said to leading to a partial numbing of the psyche so that the emotional and sensory life are diminished. Anxiety-provoking data is effectively filtered out and the numbing effect intensified unless the despair is worked through. In this respect it is not dissimilar from grief.

Despair has been seen as the ultimate development of pride when it is so great and so stubborn that it chooses the total misery of damnation rather than admitting the self's weakness, its inability to fulfil its destiny and its dependence on God. It is the extreme of self-love, expressed as self-pity when one's own resources fail. Since one's own resources invariably do fail, all are subject to some extent to discouragement and despair. The cure is humility, since the humble feel no self-pity.