An existential crises
Children are raised in the shadow of their parents. Their thoughts and views on how the world is is gleaned entirely from their parents, it is why they ask questions. They want to know, they want to understand. It’s in their nature.
But you never really ask the real questions when you’re a child. You may ask where babies come from or why the sky is blue, but did you ever ask your parents why you were born, what your purpose is? Why is there so much hate in the world? Why are humans so different? Is God real? Is the universe real? What is the meaning of life?
As if by some funny trick of nature you are not permitted to ask these questions until you are older, until a certain consciousness of your own mortality has hit you and by that time your parents are now bored of answering your questions. They no longer find your inquisitiveness endearing and adorable. They see it as annoying in the least and rebellious at most. Your efforts to unravel the deep uneasiness that has settled in you are met with hostility and you are told not to question certain things and then they give you a book.
The Holy Bible it’s called and they tell you this holds all the answers. They tell you to read it in its entirety and pray and all would be revealed.
Ecstatic, you devote hours upon hours to this incredible book, certain that it holds all the answers. You open it and begin at Genesis. It tells you about the creation, your heart leaps. Surely this will explain where we all came from, you tell yourself. This will explain why we even exist. You move on, across all the different chapters until you get to the very end where the final chapter talks about a terrible apocalypse awaiting all who don’t believe in God.
You close the book, perplexed. This answered nothing, it’s all a bunch of stories similar to the ancient Greek mythologies. You remember when your parents told you to pray for understanding, so you do. Multiple times but it doesn’t help. There are confusing verses, conflicting sentences, traits that are not reconcilable with the character of God you’ve been brought up to know. Rather than answers you’re left with more questions. Questions that no one is willing to answer, questions that people tell you to keep shut about.
You turn to the internet, it tells you God isn’t real, it tells you that you are a random fluctuation. Practically an accident, you are but one of infinite possibilities and are an insignificant tiny speck floating in an indifferent and uncaring universe.
“No! That can’t be right. I am far too complex, too smart to just be a circumstance. I can think, I can breathe, I can invent. Surely there must be a reason I’m here, there was a reason I was born. I’m not a statistic, someone out there cares for me. Someone that’s beyond my comprehension, someone who despite being so great still takes the time to listen to me” you tell yourself.
Something in you revolts at the idea that perhaps you are insignificant and how could you be? You are destined for an amazing future, you have a bright future over the horizon. Unfortunately you fail to see how self-absorbed you are being. How your self-importance pushes you into thinking you are meant for something. You fail to realise that nothing revolves around you, no one had to listen to you and why should they? What’s the difference between you and them? What voice do you have? What right do you have to anything?
I was raised to believe in God. I was raised to understand that my all belonged to him, he controlled my faith and I am his to use. It gave me a sense of purpose once before and now that I have stepped back in order to exercise my free will. I find myself once again without purpose. I ask myself however, do I need a purpose? Do I need something to live for? Why can’t I just be? After all I am a human *being*, my entire existence is “to be”. Why do I concern myself with the idea of a purpose? Why do I concern myself with where I am in the grand scheme of things?
I could have been anyone, I could have been anything. I close my eyes and wonder how life would be if I had a different name and I grew up in different circumstances. Surely my life would be different and if it would be different then does that not confirm how random life is but when I consider the odds, how out of an infinite number of possibilities, this is the one that exists. Does that mean I’m meant for something grand? And if I am, what happens when I turn out not so grand. Have I then failed my assigned life mission?
Is this what people mean when they say they’re “woke”. Does being “woke” mean understanding their place in the universe, which is both no place and all places at the same time?
