One of my biggest, most rampant, most badly behaved interests is existence: my existence, your existence, our existence, what that existence means, how to do it well, and what we get out of it.
When I talk about “existence,” I do not mean anything complicated. I just mean, the fact that I’m here, that you’re here, that we’re all here.Some philosophers try to make existence very #complicated, but I think it’s all very #simple.
However, to me, that does not make it any less baffling.
Let me put this in context. Let’s assume that there is some indeterminacy in the universe; things aren’t set to happen one way or another, and there’s a potential universe out there that’s different from this one. This is not that hard to believe if we believe in free choice; at least, there’s a possible earth where we did not appear. In fact, I would venture to say that human life is so unlikely that there are billions and billions of possible earths or universes where we did not make the guest list.
This does not mean that we are VIPs. It means we got very very very very VERY lucky. We don’t need to be here on this planet. There is no universal decree, and we are not the answer to some cosmic equation. We are more of a byproduct of this biosphere’s resources and semi-random processes. I don’t like saying we are an “accident,” because to me that means “mistake.” I prefer to think of us as one of many possible outcomes on a billion-billion-sided die, tossed by an unknown force onto an expansive cosmic table.
Read more about Davidism here.
With that in mind, I find myself puzzled at some things people say. One thing that I hear from countless people my age and older is this: “Try to find the good in the bad. Look for the silver lining in the clouds. Every misfortune is a blessing in disguise. Count your blessings.” People say this because life comes with a large share of pain, and we look for ways to cope with that pain. I don’t think I have met anyone who is not trying to cope with some kind of physical or emotional pain.
But after thinking about how random and unlikely our existence is in the first place, I am starting to think that all this silver lining stuff is complete bullshit.
I mean, it’s a nice thought, but it’s just missing the point.
We’re here, dammit.
WE EXIST.
And to me, the fact of our existence is so massively important that it outweighs anything anyone could say about it. No matter what our existence contains — whether it is pleasant or unpleasant — the unavoidable fact is that we exist.
If this is not astounding yet, it will be soon. Try to think of what it would be like not to exist. I do not necessarily mean to be “dead,” but rather just to cease being. Think of all your senses disappearing, all your memories vanishing, and all your thoughts dissolving. It’s hard — if not impossible — to imagine. However, it is as possible as any other number on the billion-billion-sided die.
Ironically, people have been wondering about non-existence for thousands of years. One example that sticks out to me is a fictional character, Hamlet, from Shakespeare’s play. When Hamlet’s father’s ghost revealed to him that he was murdered by his brother, Hamlet is so distraught that he considers killing himself. He tries to imagine what it would be like not to exist. And he, like everyone else who ever tried, failed.
To be, or not to be? That is the question —
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And, by opposing, end them?
What Hamlet didn’t realize was that this was a really dumb question to ask. It’s like asking yourself at breakfast whether you would prefer Pop Tarts or some food item that doesn’t exist. Which is better? Nobody knows, and nobody ever will, because it’s a dumb question. You have to eat. In the same way, there is no question about whether existence is better than non-existence. Existence is the only option.
Although Hamlet’s question was irreparably stupid, Hamlet was not stupid. He was a pretty regular guy. But like so many people, he was asking the wrong question. And he was asking the wrong questions because he did not realize that we are one possible outcome on a billion-billion-sided die. In other words, he could not understand that existence is a privilege.
In the end, Hamlet did the smart thing. He didn’t kill himself. He chose life. However, he did that for the wrong reasons. At the end of his famous soliloquy, he says, “There’s the respect | That makes calamity of so long life,” which essentially means, “We can’t figure out whether it’s better to live or die, so we live long miserable lives in the hopes that something will get better eventually.”
Personally, I think that’s dismal.
If Hamlet understood that the whole of human existence was a chance result on the billion-billion-sided die, and that he didn’t have to be born, and that there was no intelligible alternative to life, he would have said this:
TO BE. TO BE. THAT IS THE ONLY OPTION. | ’TIS WONDERFUL TO LIVE, TO SUFFER | ALL OF FATE’S GREAT JOYS AND WOES | WHAT ELSE IS THERE TO KNOW BUT LIFE? | MY BODY CAPTIVE TO SENSATION | THE HEARTACHE AND THE THOUSAND SHOCKS | THAT FLESH IS HEIR TO — ’TIS A PRIVILEGE | I WOULD NEVER CAST AWAY. TO DIE, TO END. | TO END, NEVER TO BEGIN AGAIN. FOR AFTER DEATH | NO JOY, NO PAIN, TO HUMAN FEELINGS RING AGAIN | AND ALL I LOVED IN LIFE NO LONGER IS.
When a person does not take life for granted, he or she become a lover of fate. The “love of fate,” to which people sometimes refer in Latin as amor fati, is central to the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, a man famous for affirming life. He gazed into the abyss of existence, saw no meaning, and then danced.
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To love fate is much bigger than finding the silver lining in one’s circumstances. Loving fate means accepting both your sufferings and your joys as equally integral parts of the strange and rare experience of being human — and to choose to love it all. After all, this is all you get. You don’t get a second life. Who knows? You might not even get an afterlife. Everything that life can be is right here, right now.
This applies to everyday life. For example, if you just accidentally cut your finger while you were slicing strawberries, that is really fucking cool, because you have a body, and you have blood, and you’re in pain, and that’s what it means to be alive.
If you just got laid off from your job, hell fuckin’ yeah. The disappointment you feel in yourself and your frustration at the system and all your anxiety about what you’re going to do to feed your kids…that’s part of what it means to be human. This is the beginning of a new chapter in life. Celebrate that.
If you just broke up with your SO, and you’ve cried yourself to sleep every night for the past week, and you can’t imagine how you’re going to go on, it’s time to realize that you are having one of the most intense human experiences of your entire life. It’s called heartbreak, and it is going to change you forever. Don’t be afraid. Just keep breathing and feeling it.
If you’re stressed because of your job, and you’re pulling your hair out about your deadlines, rock on. Nothing amazing happens in this world unless somebody is pulling her hair out about deadlines. Be thankful that you exist, and you get to know what that side of life is like.
Living a human life is not about being at peace and relaxed and happy all the time. It’s about everything: and that includes the most terrible terrible. Your body is designed to feel pain, to be stressed, to be challenged, to endure. In fact, if you are not suffering, I believe you are at a disadvantage. If you are not suffering, you are missing much of what existence has to offer.
This Holiday season, do not go the way of those I like to call the “grateful dead” — the masses who claim to be thankful for the little things but completely miss the big picture. Do not go the way of the yogis and seek inner peace at the expense of your passion. Be thankful for your pain, for the ways life has stretched you and punched you and ripped you to shreds. If it were not for all the pain you went through, your existence would be a fraud, you would be living an empty version of human life.
Be thankful that you can feel, that you have breath, that you can think.
Be thankful that there is anything at all.
Learn more about the strangeness of existence.
