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(Warning: first draft that is barely proofread)
A billion years ago the earth was here, and it will be here for a billion more. The 159 days i have left in the army are nothing. They are not even significant in my temporally insignificant lifetime. But it feels like mount fucking everest is ahead of me. My service is not as physical as others, but its mentally exausting. 159 days left of alarms at 05:30. 159 days left of studying 08-20 daily. It's insignificant in your life, as well as the life of 8 billion others, but it feels quite concrete to me. I'm not sure what I even want. It's not like it can be helped. I just wish for change, which seems like a recurring theme in my life. I just feel so fucking empty. I feel like a spectator, trapped in a body that refuses to break out of this monotonous hell. I don't *do* anything, but I want nothing else. I have always struggled with apathy, but it has never felt this tangible. Life has been in a transition state for the past couple of years, always waiting for something real to begin. What I do now doesn't feel real. It is just something I have to do as a fucking hurdle before being able to start life for real. At the same time I know life doesn't get any more real than this. I might never be able to settle down or start what I percive as real life, and that is fine too. But in that case I just wish to find my ataraxia, even though I know that removes part of being human. I just wish to be able to lay down under a linden tree next to a small river and not have a responsibility in the world to think about. But responsibilities are not optional.
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I can't always be responsible for everything that happens to me, but I will *always* be responsible for how I catch what is thrown at me. I will always have a choice in how I interpret things, and my outlook is to blame on no one but myself. I see the irony in that considering the self-pitying wall of text that is the previous paragraph. But being able to choose is no trivial thing, and the fact that there is no parachute to catch me, and no one else to rely on for my choices is both intimidating and liberating. Sarte said existance preceeds essence, meaning we are thrown into a world where there is no inherent meaning, and that any meaning is up to ourselves to create, through the choices we make and the actions we perform. We are condemmed to be free, and that is, simply put, fucking scary. There is nothing to fall back upon, and we are all responsible both for our choices, and ensuring we take an active position in them. We need to confront this fear of choice, and somehow learn to embrace this freedom.
Camus argued there are three responses to the absurdity of the world we are thrown into: physical suicide (bad), philosophical suicide (less bad, but still bad), and the Revolt of the Absurd (good). Camus Revolt of the Absurd, contrasting to Sarte, places focus not in being able to choose, but choosing to embrace an existance void of essence, and laughing in the face of the absurd. Both the exhilerating realization of choice Sarte discusses, and the confrontive and liberating revolt Camus discusses are their respective solutions to nihilism, and both are enticing in their own ways. To summarize these two standpoints and my rambling-ass discussion of them:
Both these ideologies hold merit, and I really have nothing to contribute to the conversation between them. I just find it interesting to tune in and see what I can learn, and how it might be applied to how I look at things. Backtracking a bit, the way I am soley responsible for my response and outlook, as well as what Sarte would call radical freedom, I guess frightens me. I think I long for external control, for an inherent meaning, and for a road to walk. But there is no road. I have to figure out the route with the choices I make, and I have to pave the road strong enough by the resilience and authenticity of my decisions.
Road work ahead? I sure hope it does.