I just wanted to share with you guys why even though I think life is pointless I still chose to live on
Why live? Is I’m going to die anyway, if there is nothing after this, if my life has only been eating disorders, social anxiety, depression, ADD… Why live if I have already given up on ever having a romantic relationship, let alone a family, because only thinking about it exhaust me… Why live if I don’t want to achieve anything?
After all, for a nihilist life is pointless, why all these people keep procreating and suffering? Why not just give up on existence?
What’s the point of life?
A question I do not have an answer for; but even if I did or even if I took my life away it wouldn’t change a single but crucial fact: Everything might be a Lie but Pain and Suffering are NOT.
Even if I die people and other living creatures will suffer.
Pigs and chicken will have to live sad existences inside crowded cages. Cows will be cruelly slaughtered without being stunned before.
Kids will be abducted and forced into prostitution, hard labor and war.
Humans will keep hurting and killing other humans.
The pain everyone of this beings experience right now is real, never mind there is a point in existing or not.
If I die now it’d be pretty much the same as if I die in 20 years’ time with a degree, material wealth, fame and family….. But if I choose to live on I can put all my efforts into helping one of those existences to stop the suffering, I can help spread that work, maybe that will help to stop the suffering of another 2-3 or even 1000 beings?
And what do I do meanwhile? Enjoy of a beautiful rainbow or eat a tasty red apple or go swimming at the beach with no pressures to be pretty, slim, have a career , money or family or achieve anything I don’t feel like achieving…. Because after all
Existence is meaningless the pain some people and animals are experiencing right now is real and if something can be done then I’ll do all I can to change an existence for better.
15 comments
The noble cause of enduring one’s own suffering, for the opportunity to contribute to the reduction of the suffering of others… is an objectively worthy cause.
Life doesn’t need an innate meaning. People should not be taught that life is supposed to have an underlying, supernatural, divine purpose. That only leads to basing one’s actions on misunderstanding existence, and very often, profound disappointment and despair.
Life is its own meaning.
You have a consciousness. You are aware of your existence, and able to interact with your surroundings, and experience all (or most) of the various complex dynamics of being sentient, sapient, and mobile.
I think the inherent “meaning” of life, can ultimately be found in the fact that it ends. It’s finite. It’s limited.
Why am i ‘me?’
Why are you ‘you?’
Why is my consciousness tied to this body, instead of yours? (and vice versa)
Basically, life is something we didn’t ask for, can’t fully understand or explain, enables us to do and be and act… and so it just seems right that we should try to use it while we have it, as much as we can, before it ends.
Choosing to live despite hardship, simply means that you understand the difference between something and nothing, and the value and rarity of this chance, and that the chance to engage this experience is worth taking it and using it as it is, for what it’s worth.
You can look around at all that’s wrong, and try to fix stuff… or you can decide it doesn’t matter, and let everyone else deal with it.
But sometimes, some people are afflicted with so many obstacles and disadvantages, that they realistically cannot contribute or alter anything in any significant way.
The truth is that life doesn’t matter. Not even suffering matters. It’s real, it sucks, and it sure feels like it matters while it’s happening… but it does have an end.
If you want your life to have meaning, then find something you care about, and do it. That’s the whole point, i think. Do what you care about, what matters to You, what You find meaningful… while you can. And there you have your meaningful existence.
“Who in the world am I? asked Alice (in Wonderland). Ah that’s the great puzzle! The question may make you wonder about taking time to ponder such philosophical babble. The answer is usually defined by what you can control. A reply might be I can wiggle my toes but I can’t move the legs of the table.â€The dividing line between self and nonself is taken to be the skin. This is reinforced every day of our lives — every time you fill out a form: I am ___ (your name here). It’s such an integral part of our lives that the question is as unnatural as scrutinizing breathing.
Years ago I published an experiment with Harvard psychologist B.F. Skinner (the father of modern behaviorism) showing that like us animals are capable of ‘self-awareness.’ We taught pigeons to use a mirror to locate a spot on their body which they couldn’t see directly. Although similar behavior in primates is attributed to a self-concept, it’s clear there are different degrees of self-awareness. For instance, we didn’t report in our paper that the pigeons attacked their own reflection in the mirror. Biocentrism suggests we humans may be as oblivious to certain aspects of who we are as the pigeons.
We are more than we’ve been taught in biology class. Everyday life makes this obvious. Last weekend I set out on a walk. There was a roar of dirt bikes from the nearby sandpit, but as I went further into the forest the sound gradually disappeared. In a clearing I noticed sprays of tiny flowers dotting the ground. I squatted down to examine them. They were about a quarter-of-an-inch in diameter with yellow centers and petals ranging in color from white to deep purple. I was wondering why these flowers had such bright coloring, when I saw a fuzzy little creature with a body the size of a BB darting in and out of the flowers. Its wings were awkwardly large and beating so fast I could hardly see their outline. This tiny world was as wondrous as Pandora in Avatar. No i was just a guy on a walk.
There we were, this fuzzy little creature and I, two living objects that had entered into each others’ world. It flew off to the next flower and I, for my part stepped back careful not to destroy its habitat. I wondered if our little interaction was any different from that of any other two objects in the Universe. Was this little insect just another collection of atoms — proteins and molecules spinning like planets around the sun?
It’s true that the laws of chemistry can tackle the rudimentary biology of living systems and as a person I can recite in detail the chemical foundations and cellular organization of animal cells: oxidation, biophysical metabolism, all the carbohydrates lipids and amino acid patterns. But there was more to this little bug than the sum f its biochemical functions. A full understanding of life can’t be found only by looking at cells and molecules. Conversely, physical existence can’t be divorced from the animal life and structures that crdinate sense perception and experience (even if these too have a physical correlate in our consciousness).
It seems likely that this creature was the center of its own sphere of physical reality just as I was the center of mine. We were connected not only by being alive at the same moment in Earth’s 4.5 billion year history, but by something suggestive – a pattern that’s a template for existence itself.
The bug had little eyes and antenna and possessed sensory cells that transmitted messages to its brain. Perhaps my existence in its universe was limited to some shadow off in the distance. I don’t know. But as I stood up and left, I no doubt dispersed into the haze of probability surrounding the creature’s little world.
Science has failed to recognize those properties of life that make it fundamental to our existence. This view of the world in which life and consciousness are bottom-line in understanding the larger universe — biocentrism — revolves around the way our consciousness relates to a physical process. It’s a vast mystery that I’ve pursued my entire life with a lot of help along the way standing on the shoulders of some of the most lauded minds of the modern age. I’ve also come to conclusions that would shock my predecessors, placing biology above the other sciences in an attempt to find the theory of everything that has evaded other disciplines.
We’re taught since childhood that the universe can be fundamentally divided into two entities — ourselves, and that which is outside of us. This seems logical. Self is commonly defined by what we can control. We can move our fingers but I can’t wiggle your toes. The dichotomy is based largely on manipulation, even if basic biology tells us we’ve no more control over most of the trillions of cells in our body than over a rock or a tree.
Consider everything that you see around you right now — this page, for example or your hands and fingers. Language and custom say that it all lies outside us in the external world. Yet we can’t see anything through the vault of bone that surrounds our brain. Everything you see and experience — your body, the trees and sky — are part of an active process occurring in your mind. You are this process, not just that tiny part you control with motor neurons.
You’re not an object — you are your consciousness. You’re a unified being, not just your wriggling arm or foot, but part of a larger equation that includes all the colors sensations and objects you perceive. If you divorce one side of the equation from the other you cease to exist. Indeed experiments confirm that particles only exist with real properties if they’re observed. Until the mind sets the scaffolding of things in place they can’t be thought of as having any real existence — neither duration nor position in space. As the great physicist John Wheeler said No phenomenon is a real phenomenon until it is an observed phenomenon. That’s why in real experiments not just the properties of matter — but space and time themselves — depend on the observer. Your consciousness isn’t just part of the equation — the equation is you.
After she left the pool of tears, the Caterpillar asked Alice Who are you? This was not an encouraging opening for a conversation. Alice replied, rather shyly I—I hardly know, Sir Perhaps the Hookah-Smoking caterpillar, sitting there on his mushroom, knew that this unusually short question was not only rude, but difficult indeed.
Wow… i just learned a new word: “biocentrism.”
Also: i am quite certain that things we have not yet observed, do in fact exist. When a tree falls in the woods, it makes a sound, even if nothing is around to hear it. Phenomena we have not yet observed, which we do not yet understand, and most likely some which we will never see or be capable of understanding, must exist.
There are some “crazy” ideas floating around lately.
I don’t think that “Science has failed to recognize those properties of life that make it fundamental to our existence.” I think it’s just that some things that aren’t yet understood well enough to be appropriately quantified, have not yet become “established” in officially accepted theories and models. I doubt anyone would disagree that Life is a pretty huge “phenomenon,” which certainly interacts significantly with its environment. I’m pretty sure that’s actually included in the definition of “life.”
Anyway… good post. 🙂
Now, if only i could find a way to get paid to think about stuff like that…
Aaaaaaaaahhhh!
LOL… Why “Aaaaaaaaahhhh!” ?
I just think that certain hypotheses are taking certain aspects of the process too far, and applying them inappropriately, even to the point of contradicting what we actually observe.
There is no way anyone is going to convince me without PROOF, that “Science” is saying that stuff only exists if we know it exists. I mean, come On, are you kidding? Stuff exists, even if all humans die right now. It just seems like they’re trying to set up the next “new age hippie pseudo-science” and tie it into “out of sight, out of mind,” and then say that we can just “believe (hard enough)” our way into a new reality.
Bullshit. Seriously.
It’ll be at least 1000 years before anyone is literally creating reality with their minds, manifesting it directly from pure thought and intention. And that’s basically what “it doesn’t exist until we observe it” really means. You might as well just skip to the claiming God is real too, just because lots of people believe it hard enough.
I didn’t hit all the points i wanted to hit, but man that was a huge post, and i get overwhelmed enough just trying to analyze myself, which is easily my most familiar topic. Not really trying to fight, but i find a few glaring “trigger” points in this whole new-age “science” stuff. I think things are getting out of hand, and kinda becoming not science, in some places.
Still, i thought your post was overall good, aside from those couple of things, and i’m not really discounting it.
I’m going to run away screaming from this potentially endless discussion now.
Woke up depressed as hell, telling self to go buy the gun, but that little tiny part of me still says, “no, wait, maybe there’s some solution to this mess.” Reading this thread was extremely helpful. People on here are smart, and somehow an intellectual discussion on self and existence was helpful in reactivating my intellectual defenses, my highest level defense.
My life has deteriorated so dramatically that I’ve really lost who I am. I’m certainly no longer identified by my profession, family, location, or hobbies. And existence? What is that?
Marc: Thank you for posting this topic. The last part of the title with the question mark really hit me. Every choice I make is a choice toward life or toward death. If I choose to eat, exercise, speak with others, then I’m making living choices. If I sit all day making suicide plans, feeling angry, not taking care of myself, I’m making dying choices. It’s the in-between part that might be hardest–living and dying at the same time (figuratively speaking). Wanting to reach out but pulling back because of the futility or because I’ve burned all my bridges. Some part of me wants to tell someone I do want to live, please help me, but there’s no one there (?) and people have tried. So I’m back to my lonely self and feeling so very fragile.
Donnie: I’m really interested in your knowledge base and comment about the theory of everything. I have a strong interest in physics and sometimes it’s the only thing that can give me hope. If you ever want to email about this stuff, I’d be up for it. Interested in your thoughts on Higgs and other things.
Clevemame: I agree to a large extent to what I think you’re talking about in regard to NEW AGE and science. I spend way too much time reading about conspiracy theories on the internet for entertainment (and perhaps to convince myself this life really IS shitty and we have no control). I like Buddhist thought, which the New Age has co-opted, but worried we’re all being led down a shiny hole that looks good (“Lets all be ONE”) but might result in a totalitarian world state.
I think in all these ideas, the thought that comes through most profoundly for me has to do with control. We know our perceptions control our reality. My current reality tells me that without money and lots of other things I’ve lost, I have little control and therefore no desire to exist. But looking at that bug on that flower–I do have control over my ability to engage in that moment. Apologize for rambling, but I’m just trying to figure out how to change my thinking and behavior before it’s too late. I feel like I passed that point a long time ago, but if I’m hesitating on buying the gun, then …
Dude, it’s because you know, deep down, death is not really what you want… it’s just that you’re extremely dissatisfied with your life, and feel like you don’t have enough control over the right things, to make it what you want it to be. Meanwhile, it’s agonizing watching your finite and precious time dwindle, “wasted” in so many ways…
And i think what you need to do is get into a physically comfortable position and breathe deeply, slowly, deliberately, and just relax and empty for a little while…
And then eat something “healthy,” like a banana or something…
And when you’re ready to start trying to solve problems, don’t “furiously ponder,” but rather focus on things you can actually effectively control, and try to let it sort of flow organically. You can guide it and even push a bit, but as soon as you cross the line into forcing and demanding and “gripping” your thoughts, it’ll become much more difficult.
Like has been repeated in a few places around here: you can’t fix years of backlogged baggage in a few days or weeks.
Try to let go of all those unnecessary desires and attachments, and try not to overwhelm yourself with excess maintenance requirements. Save your time and energy for the really important things, take care of yourself between, and accept that maybe most other people just can’t understand, and so try not to blame them if/when they judge you for something, because they don’t understand.
Idk, i just liked what you said and it provoked this response.
Cleve: I’m technically a dudette, but I’ve found “dude” to be a nice transgender word like “buddy”, so dude is fine. I really appreciate all the time you put in in responding. You picked up on the fragility and your advice is just what I need; gentle guidance for how to get through this day and these feelings. My goal today will be to breathe, relax, not push myself, and eat a banana. :). I’ll work on guiding and pushing but not gripping or attaching too hard.
I feel like I’ve been throwing an internal (and sometimes external) tantrum for a long time. I’ve avoided journaling or even letting myself think too much (I mean, the kind of thinking that involves actual insight, remembering who I was, trying to problem-solve) for fear I’d fall apart with grief again over all I’ve lost. I need quiet time with myself that’s neutral or at least not self-destructive in tone. I know in the end it is up to me. Why that frightens me after all the betrayal I’ve convinced myself I’ve experienced, I don’t know. Though I don’t trust others, I’ve never really felt capable of functioning on my own. This feels like some life test I’m bound to fail, yet that’s a story I tell myself, isn’t it? Crying a lot is ok sometimes.
This site is helpful. Thank you again.
I don’t think life has a point, at least not a grand unified point for all beings. Life is more like a piece of paper and a pencil that everyone can do whatever they want with. Part of the problem (why so many of us are here) is we struggle with society or adhering to others’ expectations. I used to be extremely depressed until it hit me like a ton of bricks (after age 30) that I alone decide how I feel. I can choose to be happy. Too many times I sought advice or feedback from my friends, only to realize all this time I had been putting their desires for me, ahead of my own. So I stopped doing that. I still get frequent calls from my parents venting their disapproval of my life but it is *my* life to live, not theirs. If I followed my parents’ advice I would be working an office job I hate, married with 2-3 kids I don’t want, and i’d probably be begging for death every day. Right now I am HAPPY. For possibly the first time in my life. In life everyone has so many options but most of us don’t realize it. Do what you want, do what you love,, if you hate it quit doing it. Don’t compare your life to other people’s. Jusy keep doing your thing and keep looking forward.
Embargo: I think it might have been Alfred Adler who talked about humans’ attempts to escape from freedom. So I see what you mean about the paper and pencil. Does any particular behavioral or thought technique work for you to help prevent you from assessing your worth via comparison with others? I know you’re right, but don’t know how to do it.
Clever: but what’s the point of taking advantage of this opportunity before it ends? I truly think this question is a result of over thinking something so simple as ‘being here’. I’m pretty sure my dog doesn’t question why she should go on. She wakes up happy to see what the day will bring. She goes to the kitchen following the aroma of a nice beef soup, she plays with her toys, takes naps, enjoys every second of life until it’s finished.
I’m just speculating but i amuse many members of tribes still live their lives enjoying the here and now. Reproduce, hunt, gather, survive, gather together to eat and party at night.
People living in more structured (just a way of putting it) society might have it more complicated and need a reason to put up with such a complicated system (education, home loans, jobs, medical insurance, various relationships, retirement); but i have found that lots of them,at least in their early years don’t really need a reason, because THEY ACTUALLY ENJOY many things life has to offer: they enjoy having friends, partying, drinking, relationships,music, etc.
I’m not saying i don’t enjoy most of these things (well i don’t enjoy socializing, drinking, going out, etc) but to me the enjoyment of these things is not strong enough to make me want to live. If i had the chance of being born again, without having to worry about money, living the perfect life, enjoying the things i enjoy the most and being who i wanted to be… I’d still think the effort is not worth it…. Therefore I DO need a reason to keep living; enjoying these things is not enough for me.
embargo: you’re completely right but I don’t wish for the ‘normal’ life. last year i resign from my 9-5 desk job which i was “lucky” to get after doing an internship in the same company, i moved into retail (which is just a means of saving up to start my own business and escape something i LOATHE ,working for other lol)… family and friends tough i had gone crazy. But if i no longer wake up every week day lamenting i indeed woke up and didn’t die during my sleep, then was i really crazy?… I see my peers, ex classmates getting married, having kids, buying houses. I don’t desire what they have, i probably wonder from time to time, compared to them, how lonely i’ll be in a few years time when my parents have passed away …. I am happy in this instant; i watching my favorite show, it makes me happy, as happy as a beautiful sunset, a quiet morning walk at the beach, a call from my sisters or parents.
Catchthebus: people are nice, there are some who really wish you well and truly want to help you… but as Donnie put it in his/her story everyone is “center of its own sphere of physical reality”. It’s not that they don’t care or they’re bad. It’s just the way it is (i’m pretty sure you know this already hehe). We were born alone and die alone. Some might argue “but people who give their lives for others….” yeah,i agree… but it might a way of protecting their legacy; they can have their own reasons… in a few cases they might have tamed their instinct and now they can actually put some’s well being before their own(speculating again). But ultimately depending on others and getting hurt when they fail to meet our expectations on how we think we should be treated and help, in my experience is a recipe for disaster
Donnie: i wish i had the intellectual capacity, spam of attention and didn’t have the language barrier to be able and comment on your post. However, It doesn’t take away the fact i really enjoy reading it.
Because once it’s gone, you can’t.
It’s up to you to decide whether to value that, and to what degree.
I doubt that value can be quantified.
Having the chance to do something, is infinitely greater than not existing.
Makes sense from some perspective
However i still think not existing would have been superior. This little bracket between nothingness and nothingness is meaningless to me, some have encounter a meaning, some have borrowed a meaning and some enjoy it without needing a meaning.
But if i achieve plenty of happy moments (as i currently am) at the end it’s all going to be gone. Yes, i understand something doesn’t have to be infinite to be worth it, but at the end of the day if i didn’t exist in the first place (or if i die now) i wouldn’t have suffered at all (and let’s face it,for a great number of humans suffering moments outweigh happy ones) …and wouldn’t i have needed those happy moments either.
Anyway, I’m not suicidal anymore, i have a reason to live and a reason to not die (that’d kill my parents and sadden my sisters). Therefore i enjoy every situation life put me in front of.
What about the people who don’t encounter a meaning, don’t want any of the meanings anyone else finds acceptable, and can’t just go on meaninglessly… and ultimately find a way to /create/ a meaning they find valuable?
Also: we can hypothesize about “what if’s” all day, but the fact is that you’ve already suffered, and will continue to do so. You can choose to make that suffering worth whatever meaning you give it. You’ve already suffered, and you know it’s not going to change much, so you might as well use this chance to make it mean something, make it worth something, find something “good” that’s worth the hassle and frustration… right?
Obviously, i can see both sides. One critical aspect of giving life meaning, is that you have to want it enough to do what you can to stay positive (if only realistically so), so that you can create rightness instead of wrongness.
I do understand how… sickening, it can be, to be “ready to go” and have people throwing rainbows and sunshine at you, just hoping it will stick, while from the other side, it seems so stupid.
I’m just here.
You have what you have, until you don’t, so you might as well try to use it up and get whatever you can out of it.
I can’t find a point where i disagree with you . What you call in your post ‘meaning’ i call it in mine ‘reason to live (what i consider) a meaningless life”.
It might be that i actually found a ‘meaning’ for my life but refuse to accept i have one. I might actually be alive because i want to enjoy this chance but i’m too stubborn to admit it, who knows….