Life Is Empty And Meaningless
… and it’s empty and meaningless that it’s empty and meaningless.
FYI: I do have a point, but I’m waiting to see if anyone nails it in the comments section.
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Posted by Alex Shalman in Thinking | January 17, 2008 | Digg | Del.icio.us | Stumble | Print | 32 comments
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right on mate…this is cool.
N
Hmmm. This is morbid. Kinda agree with this. Due to this feeling, I think it’s all about trying to make as much cash as possible and having the luxury to blow it on meaningless and empty things. That makes me happy. Damn I’m shallow.
Wow that is kind of short, and I do have to agree with Frank, a bit morbid.
Frank,
On the contrary, precisely because life is meaningless, you are better off NOT striving for the extreme debauchery and ‘highs’ you describe. What’s the point? It’s all meaningless, as you point out. The higher you go, the further you fall.
Ash
Alex,
Life is empty and meaningless and it’s empty and meaningless that it’s empty and meaningless. hmmm…
Here is the math…
-1 * -1 = +1
You turned two negatives into a positive through multiplication.
But I’d just say it this way…
Life is full and meaningful.
Your post is a stark reminder of how empty our lives can feel at times. However, some days are better than others; but I do tend to see these in shades of gray rather than in black and white.
What you see is what you get.
Life is nothing other than the meaning you make it to be.
My brain hurts
It’s a vicious circle.
and it’s empty and meaningless that it’s empty and meaningless.
When it’s empty and meaningless then it will be empty and meaningless.
So don’t let your life be empty and meaningless, then it won’t be empty and meaningless.
Then do something! Just do it !
Nice Alex. You’ve really got the readers thinking here.
This reminds me of a teaching in Buddhism – that life is empty. Everything is transient, and there’s no point hanging on to materialistic pursue. We bring none of these into our graves…
With such an approach, one is able to see beyond the immediate issues, open his/her perspective and see what’s truly important.
Well, I’m getting ahead of myself. Better stop here.
Meaningless, sure… but I consider that to be a good thing. Make of it (life) what you want.
But empty? I know you don’t believe that…
Tynan
Of course it is.
If you had my job and you came across that post at 10:24 p.m., as I just did, you’d be as tempted to say something like “Oh, for f*** sake, give me a break already!” as I am.
THAT’s life. THAT’s reality.
My life is full, productive, and devoted to finding meaning in the work I do & the lives of the children I am raising and the music that I make and the fur of the uncomplicated, loving dog waiting at the foot of my bed for me to come snuggle up to her for the night, so on that note . . .
Nighty-night. Buh-bye.
Grandpa always said: What you focus on expands.
someone has been to a Landmark Education seminar recently. . .
Not since August 2006, but I’ll be back there on the 25th of this month. So expect this blog to be very interesting in February =)
That is to say, life is full and meaningfull!
I think someone’s been to a Landmark Forum.
what is life?
Yes, Life is empty and meaningless. You are adding meaning to everything. Like said by Steve Olson says -1 * -1 = +1. This is the meaning he gave.
Then .. you can CREATE ANYTHING you want! So why is there struggle? because we create struggle … it’s all MADE UP. ALL OF IT! =)
Landmark Education taught you this, didn’t they?
@brandon, that is where I learned it, yes =)
Life is empty and meaningless, and that it is empty and meaningless is empty and meaningless.
Perhaps what you your saying is that, reality is void and non-existent by the more logical state of not being, but in essence, became, as i can only explain anthropomorphically, “bored,” with not being and emptiness. So after, lets say, eternity or perhaps from no time at all, everything came into being and managed to manifest itself into concioussness in the quest to seek meaning in its self, and through this evolutionary process leading to conciousness, deluding “itself” (the cosmos, conciousness as an experienced phenomena) into believing there is or are meanings to its existence that it brought about out of indifference to its eternal state of non-being and meaninglessness, and unfortuantly, or perhaps fortunatly found itself incapable of escaping its ultimate reality when the conciousness producing machinary of life realizes its absolutelty absurd and illogical condition in a universe that literally mocks any possibility of meaningfullness…in which case we as the living embodiment (or at least one version of it in local time and space) of the “will” to be and to experience, so as not to not experience, logically find our way back to the real reality and find that the whole endeavor has been…of course lol in vain and meaningless in the sense of solving or finding any meaning in the process of creation or existence, but rather finding meaning in the actual process of living, and that those meanings and creations and all things experience are relative to the local space-time consciousness present and experiencing. Or something similiar to that, all in all, a story, that has no end, nor beginning, just chapter after chapter, niether previous or future chapters visible at the time the present story is being read, but sure enough they were and will be, and the fact is we can completely know this, but never actually get to confirm it because we engineered experience that way so as to experience anything at all… lol
Very well said Chris. Quite an interesting perspective.
a)The statement that life is empty and meaningless is generally claimed by those who say it to be a statement with meaning. Some people believe this statement, and ascribe meaning to it. However, if there is no meaning to anything, then this statement would be meaningless. In order to talk about anything, you ascribe meaning to your words. Life intrinsically has meaning. If there were no meaning, it is likely we would not care much about this question, or our own deaths. All of these things would be pointless to even discuss. We would move through life without a care in the world that someday we will die. The obsession with the question of the meaning of life and fear of death points, (though not with 100% certainty) to the fact that our lives are extremely meaningful. If they weren’t meaningful, we wouldn’t give a damn and would never even think about wasting our time on questions such as these.
b) Simply because no one knows with absolute certainty what the meaning of life is does not mean that there is no meaning,
c) Saying that there is no meaning simply because we can not know with certainty what is that meaning is a baseless belief system. The fact that anything exists at all points to some kind of meaning, The overwhelming insanity of the odds of life existing points to some kind of meaning.
I am curious to hear what the argument for no meaning to life would be. So far I understand that you can’t “know” what the meaning is for sure, and somehow this is a logical basis for there being no meaning at all. Seems like a huge assumption.
-wake up.
love what the above poster, “wake up” said.
i’d also love to know the responses to the above’s comments.
IMO, he does raises some valid points, as to NOT assume there’s no meaning in life, when we don’t still don’t know with 100% certainty what is it.
love what the above poster, “wake up” said.
i’d also love to know the responses to the above’s comments.
IMO, he does raises some valid points, as to NOT assume there’s no meaning in life, when we don’t still don’t know with 100% certainty what is it.