9,834 days on Earth.
9,833 nights... some of them happy; others miserable. Some of them exhausted; others sleepless. Some of them relaxed; others stressed... and most of them anxious.
As I sat down to write this post, I had to think back on the featureless blob of intertwined memories and feelings that is my life in hindsight; perched as I am now atop the ivory tower of my third decade... and I have to say, I wasn't too impressed.
It's not fair to compare oneself to the overachievers of yore; the times when a 25 year old could somehow find the brainpower to master three or four completely unrelated branches of science or mathematics and yet still have enough time left in the day to create inventions that can shape worlds; or cure diseases previously thought incurable; or develop philosophical arguments the ramifications of which humanity still grapples with, hundreds of years later. These people -to varying degrees of success- have influenced humanity in ways that simply cannot be measured. The world without their contributions would be unfathomably different; possibly functional but more likely dark and backwards and crude... and thus, they have earned the right to have entire chapters dedicated to them in the annals of history. There is a very good reason why we are still taught about Leonardo Da Vinci and Archimedes and Socrates, hundreds or thousands of years after their deaths.
However, mindful though I am that these comparisons are unflattering at best and completely demotivating and depressing at worst, I still can't help but wonder what has been the point of all this.
For every Leonardo Da Vinci, there are untold billions of -arguably successful- people who have completely faded from history, together with their loves and struggles and pain and triumphs and families.
Twenty seven years of age is hardly the twilight of my life- at least not unless I die unexpectedly at thirty five- and yet I find myself pondering my legacy... or lack thereof. If I were to pass on tomorrow, who -if any- would still speak my name fondly or in awe in a hundred years' time?
The answer is: no one.
Now, please don't misread my tone... this is not an emotional cry for help from someone who hasn't achieved quite as much in his life as he would have wanted to; but rather a weary, resigned acknowledgement of the human condition that we all do our best to ignore- which is that only a very lucky select few of us get to have a legacy... and I don't mean necessarily with respect to a gargantuan, dark, uncaring universe -to which not even the brightest optimist can claim that we are anything but temporary, insignificant blips- but even as compared to other humans who have lived and died on this speck of dust we call Earth.
For the sake of context, let me take a step back and explain where this is coming from; ever since I was subjected to a traumatic event roughly two years ago -the nature of which some of you may have cleverly surmised from the numerous blogposts in which I pretty much flat out explained it- I have found myself turning more and more cynical and nihilistic as the days went by. At the peak of my depression, I was known to claim that nothing mattered; that life was pointless and that in the grand scheme of things, our individual lives are laughably inconsequential. It may have been an attempt to put my woes into perspective... to tell myself that if all our lives were insignificant with respect to the universe; then perhaps the pain I'd been going through simply did not matter, either.
But what I hadn't considered is that when you start believing that nothing matters, everything starts actually not mattering to you. Human contact; friendships; relationships; work- there is no point to any of it... and that is not a healthy viewpoint for a young man during his peak years.
It took me quite a bit of time to bury that belief -yes, bury; because I still believe it on some level- but the healthy compromise I have reached with my dark alter ego is that we can make our lives matter as long as we're a positive impact on our families; our friends; our communities or our countries. True, tales of my mundane daily routines will never be told on planet Mekalurku in the Pelangau galaxy, 10 billion light years away from Earth; but maybe I'm fine with that. Maybe I'm fine with just being a positive influence on the people in my life.
Perhaps, I reasoned, that could be enough.
But what if it's not enough? Or worse still; what if I'm actually not a positive impact on the people in my life?
That is where I am at, today. The reason for my melancholy isn't that I'm one year closer to my grave; it is that I'm one year closer to my grave with no achievements to speak of- at least in my own eyes. When I ask myself a simple question; have you done something to be remembered for, one hundred years from now? The simple answer is an undisputed "no"... and the saddest part is that there is very little I can do to change that. Apart from maintaining a blog that is little more than an online published diary, that is.
Due to the cyclical nature of one's birthday -which can usually be expected once a year at about the same time- I am always forced into this particular realization every year... and every birthday, I choose the figurative blue pill and go back to the dull mediocrity of human existence; in the hope that maybe by next year, I will have made some kind of impact on the world.
But as previously discussed; that will likely never happen... and I hope to come to terms with that, some day.
Anyway, enough talk about my existential dread. Time for some cake and my yearly dose of the blue pill... and no, not that one.
9,833 nights... some of them happy; others miserable. Some of them exhausted; others sleepless. Some of them relaxed; others stressed... and most of them anxious.
As I sat down to write this post, I had to think back on the featureless blob of intertwined memories and feelings that is my life in hindsight; perched as I am now atop the ivory tower of my third decade... and I have to say, I wasn't too impressed.
It's not fair to compare oneself to the overachievers of yore; the times when a 25 year old could somehow find the brainpower to master three or four completely unrelated branches of science or mathematics and yet still have enough time left in the day to create inventions that can shape worlds; or cure diseases previously thought incurable; or develop philosophical arguments the ramifications of which humanity still grapples with, hundreds of years later. These people -to varying degrees of success- have influenced humanity in ways that simply cannot be measured. The world without their contributions would be unfathomably different; possibly functional but more likely dark and backwards and crude... and thus, they have earned the right to have entire chapters dedicated to them in the annals of history. There is a very good reason why we are still taught about Leonardo Da Vinci and Archimedes and Socrates, hundreds or thousands of years after their deaths.
However, mindful though I am that these comparisons are unflattering at best and completely demotivating and depressing at worst, I still can't help but wonder what has been the point of all this.
For every Leonardo Da Vinci, there are untold billions of -arguably successful- people who have completely faded from history, together with their loves and struggles and pain and triumphs and families.
Twenty seven years of age is hardly the twilight of my life- at least not unless I die unexpectedly at thirty five- and yet I find myself pondering my legacy... or lack thereof. If I were to pass on tomorrow, who -if any- would still speak my name fondly or in awe in a hundred years' time?
The answer is: no one.
Now, please don't misread my tone... this is not an emotional cry for help from someone who hasn't achieved quite as much in his life as he would have wanted to; but rather a weary, resigned acknowledgement of the human condition that we all do our best to ignore- which is that only a very lucky select few of us get to have a legacy... and I don't mean necessarily with respect to a gargantuan, dark, uncaring universe -to which not even the brightest optimist can claim that we are anything but temporary, insignificant blips- but even as compared to other humans who have lived and died on this speck of dust we call Earth.
For the sake of context, let me take a step back and explain where this is coming from; ever since I was subjected to a traumatic event roughly two years ago -the nature of which some of you may have cleverly surmised from the numerous blogposts in which I pretty much flat out explained it- I have found myself turning more and more cynical and nihilistic as the days went by. At the peak of my depression, I was known to claim that nothing mattered; that life was pointless and that in the grand scheme of things, our individual lives are laughably inconsequential. It may have been an attempt to put my woes into perspective... to tell myself that if all our lives were insignificant with respect to the universe; then perhaps the pain I'd been going through simply did not matter, either.
But what I hadn't considered is that when you start believing that nothing matters, everything starts actually not mattering to you. Human contact; friendships; relationships; work- there is no point to any of it... and that is not a healthy viewpoint for a young man during his peak years.
It took me quite a bit of time to bury that belief -yes, bury; because I still believe it on some level- but the healthy compromise I have reached with my dark alter ego is that we can make our lives matter as long as we're a positive impact on our families; our friends; our communities or our countries. True, tales of my mundane daily routines will never be told on planet Mekalurku in the Pelangau galaxy, 10 billion light years away from Earth; but maybe I'm fine with that. Maybe I'm fine with just being a positive influence on the people in my life.
Perhaps, I reasoned, that could be enough.
But what if it's not enough? Or worse still; what if I'm actually not a positive impact on the people in my life?
That is where I am at, today. The reason for my melancholy isn't that I'm one year closer to my grave; it is that I'm one year closer to my grave with no achievements to speak of- at least in my own eyes. When I ask myself a simple question; have you done something to be remembered for, one hundred years from now? The simple answer is an undisputed "no"... and the saddest part is that there is very little I can do to change that. Apart from maintaining a blog that is little more than an online published diary, that is.
Due to the cyclical nature of one's birthday -which can usually be expected once a year at about the same time- I am always forced into this particular realization every year... and every birthday, I choose the figurative blue pill and go back to the dull mediocrity of human existence; in the hope that maybe by next year, I will have made some kind of impact on the world.
But as previously discussed; that will likely never happen... and I hope to come to terms with that, some day.
Anyway, enough talk about my existential dread. Time for some cake and my yearly dose of the blue pill... and no, not that one.
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