you ever go on a run and wonder where
the hell you're going and not just that
but why you're running and where you're
coming from
who exactly is running maybe it's a dumb
question
or maybe it's dumb not to ask it'll hit
me at random times and random places on
the bus or when I'm walking to the
supermarket
who exactly is walking to the
supermarket I don't even know why I'm
thinking these thoughts but my
conclusion always ends up being that the
Lord just doesn't make a whole lot of
sense let's start with the fact that we
live on a floating rock and are
literally only alive thanks to eat fire
ball in the sky trillions of
microorganisms that you cannot see live
in and on your body you're able to
understand what I'm saying thanks to
your brain's ability to decipher words
which now come to you in the form of
sound waves that I made with my mouth
and opening in the lower part of my face
that I used to consume food and water
you speak English of course because of a
group of violent people that were good
at boats and love a very light old lady
that wears a piece of metal on her head
from time to time I could do this all
day this doesn't get a lot better in the
picture of present-day life there are
all these gigantic global problems that
I keep hearing about and feel utterly
powerless to improve climate change
nuclear arms mass surveillance AI wealth
inequality and the awful ways we often
treat each other mainstream media feels
like it's actively making everything
worse running the same 5 sensationalized
topics on loop not to mention that I
myself not only come from a capitalistic
society that I fear is inherently
unsustainable but I'm also actively
participating in playing the game I have
my own ambitions to climb the proverbial
social ladder and live a better life
whatever that means you know I think
most of us know at some level that money
doesn't buy happiness right I mean how
many times have you heard that one yet
it still plays such an important role in
so many of our decisions things are now
evolving at lightning speed it kind of
feels like my parents grew up in a
different world and my grandparents grew
up in an alternate universe I see
massive discrepancies between the worlds
that exist on and off
it's hard to know what to believe
anymore and it's even harder to know
which direction is the right one then
there's me or I should say the concept I
have of me I don't really know why I'm
here or what I'm supposed to be doing my
best answers can sometimes feel like
they fall to pieces in the context of
everything else I should be in tears
over the miracle of life or maybe
horrified by the atrocities of war and
famine but really I'm just worrying
about how dumb I sounded in front of
that really pretty barista when I say I
what I mean is
Nathaniel drew which is nothing more
than an idea that I've built about Who I
am
I get hung up or offended when someone
threatens my values or anything I
identify with which is silly if you take
a big step back I mean people are gonna
say whatever they want whenever they
want and there's nothing I can do about
it
and yet my old world is still built
around this concept that I have of Who I
am and what I believe I can and cannot
do both my socio-economic background and
the things that occurred early in my
life shaped the particular path that I'm
on and it goes deeper in many ways I'm
run by my own biology so our that has
been encoded into me to seek food safety
and sex it's funny everything seems
really important in the moment but I'm
gonna be a pile of dust 100 years from
now if you hit pause you can see it's
all just a giant circus suddenly science
fiction doesn't sound so unbelievable
you realize that humanity is just making
it up as we go it can feel like life is
random and meaningless to be honest the
question that I sometimes ask myself is
what's the [ __ ] point I mean I'm
doing my best here to better myself and
be a productive citizen to contribute
something of value and I wonder
sometimes if it's worth it
maybe I'm nowhere near as valiant or
virtuous as I'd like to think and a lot
more self-interested than I'd like to
admit
if you can't relate please go on with
your life as you have before don't let
me complicate things further for you the
best way to avoid an existential crisis
is not asking too many questions but
it's a lot easier said than done
so if you can't relate to the things I'm
describing here and welcome to the club
let me at least share some of the things
that I've come across in my attempts to
piece things together fortunately or
unfortunately I'm far from the first
person to ask these questions
it turns out this is what philosophers
have been doing for a very long time and
they all seem to come up with different
answers context is really important and
there's probably a million different
ways you could potentially interpret the
words of these philosophers so I'm just
sharing where I'm at right now
but I do find that my views are
constantly evolving and changing whether
I like it or not people do find meaning
in many different ways including
religion or service for example to a
nation or a community or you know your
family however you probably already knew
that so I'm gonna be taking this in a
little bit of a different direction I
want to focus on what a couple of French
guys Sartre and Camus had to say on this
topic which we will now be calling
existentialism but before we talk about
existentialism we first have to talk
about essentialism and it's a different
kind of essentialism than the one I
usually talk about on this channel boil
down very simply the thinking behind
essentialism is that every entity has a
set of attributes that are necessary to
its identity and function according to
this way of seeing the world you have an
inherent purpose and in many ways it has
been decided for you and for thousands
of years the established thinking in the
West was that that was just the way it
was but then a lot of really awful
things happen throughout history like
World War two for example and people
like Sartre began questioning a lot of
established ideas he spoke about this
idea that he called the absurdity of the
world which was something that you could
see when you're pulled out of the
context of everything and can witness
even for a brief moment just how weird
everything is we can define absurdity as
the search for answers in an answer this
world and so the question comes back to
what if there are no answers I'm
cherry-picking here but one of Sartre is
big claims and the point I've been kind
of building up to is the
being precedes essence or in other words
you exist first and then you figure out
what your purpose is this is a
completely different way of looking at
the world than essentialism because it
acknowledges that we're sort of making
up the rules as we go now let's assume
for a second that that's the case right
then being or existence precedes essence
to my mind you have several options you
can believe in a higher power as most
people do in the religious or
non-religious sense or you can accept
that life is absurd and just focus on
the present moment that second option is
what kemu the other French guy believed
he argued that anything else would be
running away from reality now
alternatively you can create the meaning
in your life you know you decide what
you want to be about if you want to read
a book that'll slap some sense into you
and how good you've got things I'd
highly recommend Victor Frankel's man's
search for meaning I'm sure many of you
are familiar with the title it's about a
Holocaust survivor and my god it is both
gut-wrenching and very inspiring
actually to read the account of somebody
navigating and overcoming such
experiences but the amazing thing is
that it's up to you that angst you feel
when thinking about your life and the
meaning it should have well
Sartre had a theory for that as well he
called it on wasps or anguish and he
believed that that comes from the fact
that you're actually incredibly free and
that no matter your situation you have
an enormous amount of options at your
disposal and to be that free really is
actually an overwhelming idea it's a lot
of responsibility his thinking was that
you were basically ignoring your own
freedom and money does not equal freedom
because money can possess you or tie you
down
arguably more than anything else
so I guess what's left here are my own
personal conclusions on all this other
than the fact that my horoscope is a
black hole and my personality type is
angsty teenager I'm doing fine I'm doing
fine doing fine I don't really think
there is a right or wrong answer on all
this whether you believe in the divine
connectedness of all things or the
absolute meaninglessness of it all I
personally do believe in God
but I'm not religious I wasn't raised
religious and so my views on all this do
not directly correspond with what I
think most people associate with when
they think of God I made an entire piece
on my thoughts on that subject if you're
interested in checking it out in all
honesty I think all of us are very
self-involved but it's always been that
way I think that's the nature of life in
a world where living things die every
day I think it's way better to just
accept it than to waste energy trying to
fix other people or wish that they
changed or denied about yourself and by
the way I'm not at any point justifying
being a dick for the record when I
receive comments from people saying man
you are so self-involved I just want to
say right now you're right and I am NOT
trying to even deny that okay this whole
channel is about me in my life at the
end of the day I think any kind of
belief system or lack thereof can be
used to avoid doing or confronting the
hard things in life and ultimately I
don't think that says anything about the
belief system in and of itself and
everything about the individual so for
me it doesn't matter what you believe I
judge based on action and I really like
it when people take responsibility for
themselves and create the world that
they want to live in quick plug here for
my newsletter where i share further
thoughts on mental clarity I am making
writing a much bigger priority in my
life this year I love email newsletters
because it's completely algorithm free
which means I do not have to be blessed
by the YouTube gods to reach you with my
message so the link to it will be found
in the description down below and thank
you for watching I hope this helped
somehow maybe I don't know
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you
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