Getting Out of Bed

I find it hard to directly answer what I want my purpose in life to be, of course this is already a hard question when seen through the more zoomed out lens of "what is the purpose of ALL of life", but when made personal it should seem a little more obvious why we want to keep living. I really believe that life in general has no purpose, atleast not in the end. I think it instead has a present purpose, meaning to be here in the moment is the only incentive to live and the only reason we WANT to be here.

Invincible and inner peace

Watching Invincible really helps emphasize my point. If you haven't watched it you should but I'll try and give some very discrete context:

One side of an intergalctic society argues that objective superiority exists. Characteristics belonging to the subcategory include: strength, longetivity of live, immune system strength, intelligence, and other things seen as objectively good characteristics to have in general society. However, at a certain point this objectivity turns to an almost "ranking of superiority" between societies and individuals in them. This incentivies everyone to reach the top of this pyramid. A character in the show named Omniman comes from a society that truly believes in this and sees little to no worth in "weak people". However, when omniman is sent to earth, a much less-developed and weak planet, he builds connections to this "low-life" that his planet had told him to help strive towards perfection. Although it sounds like he is helping them, the show really shows us why we are human — feelings. We care for our species and see that when Omniman knows what hes doing by weeding out weaker individuals or killing hundreds of people to reach this end goal, the viewer still wants him to stop and so does every human in the show. Omniman wants to take over this society to help them reach the euphoric state his own world has become, but that doesn't mean anything to us, we just want to live.

Essentially what he and his society displayed is the success by results system we see today — think whiplash through a lens of "fletcher had to do what he had to do to drive success in his students". Though Omniman is not meant to care for humans and even thinks he doesn't, he sees worth in his family, his experiences, all these "short-term" connections that really have no "objective benefit" according to the goal he seeks to accomplish. That right there is the meaning of life. To experience, to enjoy the journey towards death that is only temporary.

Staying true to "living in the moment" — CAN YOU?

This sounds kind of obvious, but really no one including myself can live by it. Even though I believe experiences in the present are the only thing in life that has any worth and is why we want wealth, good looks, etc., I still find myself stuck on striving for these very things I condemn people care about too much. However, I don't necessarily think its a bad or avoidable thing to strive for these because

1: Our world is designed to incentivise becoming wealther and improved. Whether for further happiness or evolution. In order to survive in such a consumer-based world we kind of have to make money. and

2: Some people, including myself , enjoy this journey.

I love games, where even if attaining wealth to help myself, my current family and my future family has no worth when I'm gone, the experiences that the money and connections bring is all I want — it just so happens that higher status in today's world leads to more "quality time". I want to experience more, this is honestly kind of the reason I listen to so much music and try and be as open-minded as I can be. After all, what is going to tangibly or not be left of any of us after we leave earth but the memories and love we gave to others. Although sometimes I think to myself I really want to be remembered I should be more focused on WHY people are remembered in the first place, because they inspire and teach lessons to following generations.

Walking around the Heinz History Museum last week made me realize how difficult it really is to leave behind any sort of lasting legacy and how unique you have to be. But I think most people who are remembered nowadays didn't really live with the goal of being remembered but rather with the goal of doing something worth remembering. Not sure if thats gibberish to you guys.

death and immortality

All this purpose talk makes me think what it really is that makes us get out of bed in the morning. What is humanity's true end goal with becoming more advanced? Some people just live to live and thats ok, but i just feel like if you were given the chance to be born in this world then LIVE live. I'd rather live a happy 40 years of my life then a less-enjoyable 60 years and only live happy after retirement until like 80/90.

Death is extremely terrifying to me. But knowing its the one thing promised in life helps us adjust to it. I think in accordance to the fact that I'll be gone one day: What do I want to do before then? Although I feel a sense of hopelessness and a lack of purpose when my mind is clouded with dreadful thoughts of death, the aftermath is developing a plan/pivot. Why am I so scared of death? Well becase I don't want to leave yet. Well why am I not okay with leaving yet? and boom! thats your next step. Chase it until your satisfied with dying.

Immortality is even scarier than death though. Forever is infinitely long. With death you have a choice to your end and its promised. Although your end will come in a way you don't choose at a time you can't choose, its definitely going to end. The way people say all good things must come to an end seems so pessimistic but if we were constantly happy then theres nothing to look forward to. I mean ask yourself why people are living live less because of their phones: because of that constant fake dopamine rushing through our brains and making usually happy experience seem bland.

Back to immortality, there no choice but to continue living. I think its really my fear of infinity, and although it technically doesn't exist who knows, infinitely long is subjective and can't even be conceptualized in our tiny tiny human brains. I remmeber this one episode of black mirror where this happy couple lives together for the rest of time and instead of being happy for them I experienced a panic attack thinking about heaven and living forever. I feel like I'm scared because I would get bored. Maybe if I had some games or something I'd be fine. who knows.