As I write this I have learned that Tony Scott, the director of several successful action movies, has killed himself.Apparently, he jumped off a bridge in Southern California. One of my favourite lines was in his movie, ‘Top Gun’: “You’re not going to be happy unless you’re going Mach 2 with your hair on fire.”I could relate to that; I am an existential kind of guy who believes that life is a once-around kind of thing and that moments wasted in fear or inactivity, opportunities ignored, people left unmet, do not save a life, they only diminish it.This news about Tony Scott comes as I have finished writing an entry on logotherapy in the upcoming five-volume Encyclopedia of Clinical Psychology. The two subjects, suicide and logotherapy, kind of go together.Viktor Frankl, who survived three Nazi death camps while his family died in them, wrote ‘Man’s Search for Meaning’ in which he described what kept people alive in those camps and what contributed to them giving up, even when they had a chance to live.What is it that makes one person keep working out their salvation with fear and trembling (to take a phrase from Paul of Tarsus and use it as a metaphor for all of life) and another person simply give up and sink into the swamp of despair (or even worse to my mind, bury his talents in fear of not showing a profit)?Frankl believed it was the will-to-meaning, which he claimed was more important than Freud’s pleasure-seeking drive or Adler’s drive for power and social standing.Frankl did not come up with his theories because he was in the camps, but while he was in them, he had a chance to challenge his thinking with the harsh realities of brutality and deprivation he encountered there.When people lose meaning in life, when their lives seem hopeless and not linked to anything more important than mundane, day-to-day routines, then people begin to fade.The classic statement: “There must be more to it than this,” is the bottom line in such an existential analysis.I do not know what was in the mind of Tony Scott; he left a suicide note for his family, but we may never know what was in it.Usually in such things there is a hint as to why a person kills him or herself. With hindsight others then recall signs and signals of the crisis that loomed, and they often regret not having paid attention to those warnings.Evaluating lethality in suicidal thinking is an important ability for mental health professionals, but it can also be significant to people in general.Here are some areas to explore that might yield indications that you need to take your loved one to get professional help: suicidal ideation, intent, plan, access to lethal means, and a history of past suicide attempts.Let me expand on these a bit.Suicidal ideation comes in basically two varieties. On the one hand a person might wish he or she were dead (so as to find peace and escape the dreadful experience currently being experienced).On the other, a person might wish to kill him or herself. The first is more passive than the second.The second is more dangerous than the first. Many people at some time in their lives look around at the world and the mess they are in, and they wish they weren’t in it anymore.However, most people do not wish to kill themselves.When thoughts about killing oneself move to the intent to do so, things become more serious. Intent speaks to the degree of determination that a person has.When a person has decided to commit suicide, his or her intention is to do it. Loved ones and concerned persons should be alarmed with any shift in language reflecting this kind of resolve.When intention gives birth to problem-solving ways in which that intention might be completed, the lethality in someone’s suicidal ideation has become even more serious.In addition, some kinds of plans are more lethal that others. For instance, one person might say he is going to simply stop eating, but another person might plan to put bullets in a gun and shoot himself.The second plan is more lethal than the first. Any plan to kill oneself, however, is an indication that someone is getting closer to actually doing it.It makes no difference if a person has a lethal plan if he or she has no means of carrying out the plan.If a person were to say he is going to blow himself up with a nuclear device, that comes with a low level of lethality (and might indicate other mental problems!), because he probably does not have access to any nuclear device.However, if he says, “I am going to hang myself with the rope I have in my hands, by throwing it over the exposed beams in my house,” then somebody better get that rope out of his hands!When people take pills or make superficial cuts on their wrists, that is important, but it is a lower level of lethality than someone threatening to shoot himself.Finally, if someone has a history of attempting suicide, then any indication that he or she is thinking about it again must be taken seriously.I will also add two more elements relevant to this issue: mental or psychological disorder and the use of substances like alcohol.Clinically depressed people frequently kill themselves, and people with delusions often kill not only themselves but others as well.People with established disorders need to be under the care of a professional.Second, when people have reduced their inhibitions with alcohol, they become more dangerous than they might usually be.People with lethal suicidal ideation need to refrain from drinking. They should certainly not be left alone.Viktor Frankl claimed that although we cannot choose what circumstances may come our way, and we have limited control in many of our situations, we can choose what kind of attitude we will manifest in meeting our challenges, and we can choose what we will do in life that accords with our values.Meaning in life, then, makes all the difference.