The Art of Living a Meaningless Existence: Ideas from Philosophy That Change the Way You Think

by Robert Pantano

“Nobody ever figures out what life is all about, and it doesn’t matter. Explore the world. Nearly everything is really interesting if you go into it deeply enough,”

When we see someone forcing something, be it an artistic performance or a performance of the self in everyday, ordinary life, we almost always know when it is fraudulent, and we almost always dislike it. We say that it doesn’t feel natural, that it feels forced, that someone is being fake.

One of mankind’s greatest longings is complete freedom. One of mankind’s greatest limitations is the inability to ever truly be free.

“There are no facts, only interpretations,”

“Don’t bend; don’t water it down; don’t try to make it logical; don’t edit your own soul according to the fashion. Rather, follow your most intense obsessions mercilessly.”

For Emerson, great artists, thinkers, and writers aren’t necessarily great merely because they have access to any higher, exclusive source of information or being, but because they are willing to address and express candidly what they feel in any given moment of life, despite how it might compare to the apparent norm.

You will see your last sunset; you will taste your last bite of food; you will enjoy your last laugh; you will see everyone you know one last time; you will do anything for the last time; you will be you for the last time. If there is nothing specific to be done, the only thing that truly matters is that we do what matters to us while we can. There is nothing else to do, nowhere else to go. We must charge headlong into the absurdity, embrace the futility, and live hard for nothing in every moment.