GAVE UP

“ When a man says he has exhausted life one always knows life has exhausted him. ”
— Oscar Wilde

Giving up. Seems like the easy way out.

But that is how many LOST characters decided to end their lives.

Locke, frustrated and depressed that he had zero leadership skills to get the Oceanic 6 back to the island, tried to hang himself. He had given up on himself. It really should not have mattered what other people said to him. He was off the island. He had another chance to start over. But he gave up instead.

Jack, after battling Flocke to save the island, wandered off into the bamboo grove where his island journey first began, and gave up. He lied down waiting to die. Which is strange, considering we know that there were many other people left on the island that could have treated his wounds. (Including Hurley, who could give Jack apparently immortality as Jacob had given Alpert). He had another chance to start over and leave the island. But he gave up instead.

Which raises a very interesting question: why?

Jack actually did have something to go back to on the mainland. He had a medical practice. He had a widow mother who needed his support. He could have had Kate. So what exhausted Jack so much that he rather quit than go on?

Or, maybe once the island trapped his soul, his life was finite like grains of sand in an hour glass. He gave up much of his life when he gave up the guardianship as a means of trying to re-set everyone else's life timers. But there is no set answer of why Jack even believed that he had to sacrifice himself. Was it his own self-loathing - - - on par with suicidal Locke - - -  that made Jack close his eyes for the final time?

That is why Jack's end rings hollow.