Flip The Fuck Out 7: The Pensieve

[Dmatix]

Well, there's worse things to be near than death, and the person who died is certainly much closer, but it's better to be as far away as possible nonetheless. Do you have a well fortified basement or otherwise underground structure?

This is Israel. Everyone has one of those. It's not about geographical distance though, though nothing is really far in such a tiny country. What I was talking about is the shadow of war- the feeling an all out war is just around the corner, which it might very well be. If one does break out, no amount of concrete would grantee my safety and that of my loved ones, and it's a frightening thought, to say the least.

[Hatman Hatmyth Hatlegend]

I think I'mma break something if I ever hear someone speaking for the "silent majority" again.

[Varkarrus]

I'm going to flip the fuck out for not beating the shit out of a friend

pretty much I was on the subway, and a friend I hadn't seen in a while snuck up on me, grabbed my shoulder, and pulled me in for a hug. I was startled, naturally, but the sheer docility of how I went into his arms disgusted me because it meant that if it was a situation that was actually dangerous, like a guy grabbing me to stab my back or otherwise assault me, I would not act in self-defense. Granted, it's a good thing I didn't punch this guy or anything, but still it means that I would not act how I imagine I would in a situation where I'm in danger. I'd just freeze up and that's what scares me.

I don't need anyone to respond to this, just wanted to vent.

[Hatman Hatmyth Hatlegend]

Honestly I don't think it really means anything but yeah, I can see why you'd flip the fuck out.

[Kyntello]

This is Israel. Everyone has one of those. It's not about geographical distance though, though nothing is really far in such a tiny country. What I was talking about is the shadow of war- the feeling an all out war is just around the corner, which it might very well be. If one does break out, no amount of concrete would grantee my safety and that of my loved ones, and it's a frightening thought, to say the least.

Well, all I can recommend is that, whatever you can do, do it, and we wish you the best of luck.

[Frostdawn]

Hey, so like, over a year ago I posted in one of these threads about how much I hated my life and everything I'd done, and I'd just like to try to help out anybody else who may possibly going through slightly similar problems? This is the post in its entirety:

I just realized that the only thing really keeping me from being suicidally depressed at this point is MSPA, and the thought that killing myself would mean that I would never get to see the end of the current story or any of the next ones.

That thought just sort of made me feel even more pathetic than I already did. I don't even know what I'd do if Andrew ever stopped writing.

I just regret so many fucking things. I was such an antisocial stupid moron back in middle school, and while I decided to change towards the end of middle school and it's the first year of high school and I've changed a lot, I just know nobody will ever forget how I was in middle school. I've got a bunch of friends now, but I'm still hilariously socially awkward and I can never think of the right thing to say, and I can never really start a conversation on my own, if I ever talk it's always in response to someone else. Is there an official disorder where you regret literally everything you say and every single thing you do? Because if so I'm pretty sure I've got that. I can't have a single conversation without looking back on it later, thinking about how stupid everything I said was, and what I should have said. That's a pretty big contributor to why I'm always so quiet all the time too, I always think about nearly everything I want to say a million times before I actually try to say it, and if it turns out to be one of the few things that I eventually decide isn't an entirely stupid thing to say, it's already well past the point where it would have been suitable to say it. I always feel like I'm an annoyance to everyone around me, like most of my "friends" are only talking to me because they pity me.

That's another thing I hate, everyone's always too nice to me, as if they think that if they treat me like they treat everyone else, I'll just go back right to the way I was in middle school. Fuck, maybe they're right to be soft with me, I handle criticism exceptionally terribly. If I'm playing some sport in P.E. and someone just makes a little, quick remark about something I did wrong, it dampens my whole day, and I don't stop thinking about it for a while.

I hate every fucking thing about myself, from my ugly fucking face that I swear is breeding some alien mutant breed of superpimple that is literally incurable, to my stupid voice that's way too fucking quiet and which I just can't seem to make louder, to, as I said before, literally every single decision I make.

I wish I could worry about things that normal people worry about. No, I've got to be the guy who gets straight A's, literally without so much as studying a second, for a single test. I wish I could just be exaggerating. I wish I was just fucking normal. I often worry about girls and romance and stuff, which I guess is normal, but it sure as hell isn't making me feel better about myself. I'll probably end up being single for my whole life, considering how unattractive I am in every aspect possible. As I posted earlier in this thread, I was rejected by the girl I've had a crush on for most of the school year so far yesterday, (This was no surprise to me whatsoever, why the fuck did I even try? Moron.) and I don't think I'll be getting over it any time soon, I'm not the type of person who can just forget about someone like that. Hell, deep down I'm still telling myself that maybe, if I eventually manage to stop looking and sounding stupid, and continue to become more social and talkative, maybe at some point in the future I'll have a chance. I AM SO FUCKING STUPID FOR EVEN BEGINNING TO THINK THAT I WILL EVER HAVE A CHANCE, WITH HER OR ANYONE ELSE. The stupid thought that I might have had a tiny chance with her (she seemed like just maybe she might have liked me back, but nope, that was just me being overly hopeful, and her just being friendly, fuck she was even nice when she was rejecting me, but that only made it feel almost worse) was the only other thing besides MSPA keeping me from suicide, and it's gone now. I hope Andrew doesn't quit writing anytime soon.

Often I worry about seeming literally retarded to people that I talk to. I was actually part of a sort of special ed thingy in middle school, even though I wasn't actually mentally handicapped. I was just prone to violence for very stupid, insignificant things. God, I'll never be able to shake off the reputation I earned in middle school, no matter how much I change, even if I became the most handsome, charming, outspoken guy in school, those memories will never leave.



I am not going to talk to a psychologist and absolutely no argument you make will be able to change my mind on that matter.

I'd just like to let people know that things change. I've got a bunch of awesome friends who I don't have to worry about annoying or anything, I'm far FAR less awkward now, and there's hardly any acne to be found on my face at all anymore. I've learned to just accept things as they come, hardly regretting anything I say anymore. My middle school life virtually never comes up or plays any part in the life I'm living now. I'm definitely not nearly as dependent on MSPA anymore (despite still loving it to death and having it be among my top favorite things ever), because I've found many amazing things and people who I love just as much, if not more. And that girl I mentioned kind of near the end there? Scored a date with her today.

I'm not sure exactly how many people in this thread that this might speak to, if it speaks to any at all, but I'd just like to say that things do get better, guys. Don't give up. It may take some time, but things WILL get better eventually, no matter who you are. Just keep trying.

[Hatman Hatmyth Hatlegend]

I'm not sure exactly how many people in this thread that this might speak to, if it speaks to any at all, but I'd just like to say that things do get better, guys. Don't give up. It may take some time, but things WILL get better eventually, no matter who you are. Just keep trying.

Maybe if I was 10 years younger but then again I've been told that and they haven't, so...

[User 18]

Hey, so like, over a year ago I posted in one of these threads about how much I hated my life and everything I'd done, and I'd just like to try to help out anybody else who may possibly going through slightly similar problems? This is the post in its entirety:

I'd just like to let people know that things change. I've got a bunch of awesome friends who I don't have to worry about annoying or anything, I'm far FAR less awkward now, and there's hardly any acne to be found on my face at all anymore. I've learned to just accept things as they come, hardly regretting anything I say anymore. My middle school life virtually never comes up or plays any part in the life I'm living now. I'm definitely not nearly as dependent on MSPA anymore (despite still loving it to death and having it be among my top favorite things ever), because I've found many amazing things and people who I love just as much, if not more. And that girl I mentioned kind of near the end there? Scored a date with her today.

I'm not sure exactly how many people in this thread that this might speak to, if it speaks to any at all, but I'd just like to say that things do get better, guys. Don't give up. It may take some time, but things WILL get better eventually, no matter who you are. Just keep trying.

This speaks to me. You sound a lot like me.

Seems like as good a time as any to repost this:

show spoiler

hide spoiler

My 1025 specularnaodm

[Hatman Hatmyth Hatlegend]

Dear thread, fuck jealousy.

[locosocks]

I'm just feeling stressed right now... My grandmother just had a stroke today, and that's making me pretty nervous. So, along with that, my dad's going up to her home to make sure she's okay, but he has to miss my graduation. I know it's the right thing to do, for sure, and I'd do the same in his spot, but this whole situation just makes me feel depressed, you know?

[Kyntello]

This speaks to me. You sound a lot like me.

Seems like as good a time as any to repost this:

show spoiler

hide spoiler

My 1025 specularnaodm

Just adding on to this:

show spoiler

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Before Homestuck, I had barely any direction, just a trombone and a few fancies. But since I started reading Homestuck, since I heard the music, since I saw the animations, I've had more drive in the past year than the rest of my life. I started arranging pieces to different ends, figuring out rudimentary harmonics, and slowly learned how to write music. I heard the comic dubs, and foun the joy of voice acting, and slowly built my reading skills. Now, a little over one year later, I have written more than twenty pieces ranging from chiptunes to orchestral arrangements, I've been accepted to two VA casts and am awaiting results on a third, and have produced three full comic dubs, and now the above.

And I may not be perfect.
I may be far from even good.
But I still am better than I was, and still have the will to continue.
And you guys gave that to me.
Thanks, guys!

[Freack]

Wow, I missed out on the VAed version of your Specularnaodm U18. That was great.

And I am with you on all those points (as much as I can be). Homestuck and this fandom got me through lot of loneliness.

And now I am frustrated because i have no work skills and it is near impossible to get any when you can not be hired to do work. Bleh.

[User 18]

Just adding on to this:

show spoiler

hide spoiler

Before Homestuck, I had barely any direction, just a trombone and a few fancies. But since I started reading Homestuck, since I heard the music, since I saw the animations, I've had more drive in the past year than the rest of my life. I started arranging pieces to different ends, figuring out rudimentary harmonics, and slowly learned how to write music. I heard the comic dubs, and foun the joy of voice acting, and slowly built my reading skills. Now, a little over one year later, I have written more than twenty pieces ranging from chiptunes to orchestral arrangements, I've been accepted to two VA casts and am awaiting results on a third, and have produced three full comic dubs, and now the above.

And I may not be perfect.
I may be far from even good.
But I still am better than I was, and still have the will to continue.
And you guys gave that to me.
Thanks, guys!

This is a cool thing, and you are an amazing person. So is everyone else here.

Wow, I missed out on the VAed version of your Specularnaodm U18. That was great.

And I am with you on all those points (as much as I can be). Homestuck and this fandom got me through lot of loneliness.

And now I am frustrated because i have no work skills and it is near impossible to get any when you can not be hired to do work. Bleh.

That's because it's a new thing

You people are all amazing. If what I've been through can inspire someone to know that it can get better, then the time I spent making that .gif, the time I spent here on the forums, will be worth it in a whole new way.

Good luck finding a job. I know it's tricky. I count myself incredibly lucky that I was able to get the one I have. I'm sure something will work itself out.

[kholhaus]

I deleted half my 1500 word essay.
I forgot the quotes I used.

The book is 1984.

I have to do it tonight internetically.

I also have a Japanese Oral test to study for tonight but no such progress on that.

SCHOOL. The end of the year either;
A) Falls into place
B) Falls into pieces.

You can only pick one.

[Kyntello]

I deleted half my 1500 word essay.
I forgot the quotes I used.

The book is 1984.

I have to do it tonight internetically.

I also have a Japanese Oral test to study for tonight but no such progress on that.

SCHOOL. The end of the year either;
A) Falls into place
B) Falls into pieces.

You can only pick one.

That phrasing was awesome.
You'll do fine.

[anonCombatant]

(New account to hide my identity. I know people who read this forum. I don't want them to realize this is me.)

I've been doing a lot of thinking lately.

This world is not one I particularly like living in. It's a world of celebrity worship, where people - ordinary, everyday people - are idolized and deified by other ordinary everyday people for trivial accomplishments. I support the idea of praising someone who deserves it, but tabloid magazines? Celeb dating? Look at that clusterfuck surrounding the Royal Wedding a year or so back. Fame, and the pursuit of it, are poisoning the common human. Social standards instill goals that we might not otherwise have. People are told that success means Doctor, or Movie Star, or Bestseller, or Talk Show Host. People are told that if you don't win, you lose. And so we strive for success at all costs, including - especially - at the cost of someone else's success. It's a cutthroat world and it doesn't need to be. The people who succeed end up standing for an ideal, or standing in the way. They become either idols or effigies.

People who don't make it that far tend to make it just as far as they are able to. They dream of fame, they dream of the recognition they feel they deserve. Maybe they do deserve it. It's that kind of world. Katy Perry sings five minutes worth of music, hands it off to an audio engineer to make it sound better, and then rakes in millions of dollars. A fireman who risked his life for others in the wake of the 9/11 attacks dies of a preventable illness because he couldn't afford medication - the fund set up for heroes like him having been shut down by politicians looking for a way to spend more money on bombs and bullets and campaign ads.

People who recognize the dichotomy, or who have the potential to, are distracted by a constantly-blaring message of "Everything is okay." TV commercials are filled with smiling, happy people. Movies have happy endings. Things get resolved in our worlds of fiction. And of course, we're constantly being handed little fragments of entertainment, anything that will fill the empty spaces in our lives, provided by people who want money of their own to fulfill their dreams of fame and fortune. Luxuries are everything. People who don't have them are pitied. People who have plenty of them are adored and envied. Messages of equality are heeded and agreed with, until the time comes where one might actually have to give up something they own - it's a nice idea on paper, but no one wants to cut themselves down so another can rise up.

Work leads to work. School leads to school. You have to spend money to make money, and then you spend more of that money to get an even larger sum. In theory. Students look for a job so they can afford tuition, tuition that they hope will lead to meaningful education, that will in turn lead to meaningful employment. Where's the end goal? Retirement? Sitting in a nursing home, having somebody feed you soup while you reminisce about the good old days when things you liked were relevant? Or is it middle age, where you've hit the sweet spot of your career or are moving steadily toward it? The time where you're making enough money to keep yourself happy, to distract yourself from the world's injustice, and if only you had the free time to enjoy it because your high-paying job takes so much effort to stay on top of? People say the college segments are the best years of anyone's lives, but how can that be possible when they're "supposed" to be spent preparing for the future?

Friends can be a part of it. Romance can be a part of it. But in a world where everyone is out for themselves, how can you honestly trust others? It's nice in television and movies, again, where the protagonist has a crisis of conscience, a metaphorical blue screen of death, and their friends pull them out of it. But that doesn't happen in real life. People see you staring into space and sulking, and they figure you're just having a rough day. They hear you asking for help, but don't realize it goes beyond simple whining and small talk. You have fun times together, but when all's said and done, people change. They drift apart. Sometimes literally. You move away for work or school and never see your old friends again. Or when you do, their priorities have changed. It's nice to meet an old friend for dinner again, but it will never be like it was. You're forgotten.

Family works the same way. Society likes to pretend that there's an invisible bond tying everyone together simply because they're related, but that's not true at all. It's another lie perpetuated by the same people who like to ignore the world's faults. It prevents people from actually working to maintain relationships, because when something goes wrong, no one is willing to admit it's their problem. A mother won't admit that she sees her children as a job and a responsibility more than as living beings. A father won't admit that he's been too distant to have any impact on his kids' development, because he's too busy talking about all the work he does to put a roof over their heads and food on their table. Siblings are told that they'll always be there for each other, but no one ever utters the truth, which is that it only happens "when it's convenient."

The perfect world, the happily ever after, the light at the end of the tunnel, is a lie.

Here's my dilemma.

I don't see a point to it all. There are some wonders in the world, and there are some fun times to be had, but is the cost really worth it? The question is often asked, why are we here? And while some interpret it to be a question of the origin of our existence, I see it as more about the continuation of our existence. Why are we STILL here? There's no way to "win." Friendship is fleeting. In the end, everyone dies alone, and one day each and every one of us will be forgotten, and our contributions to the world as a whole will be meaningless.

I don't believe the people who claim to have faith in a positive afterlife. If you really think you'll be better off after you die, why do you continue to live? The only reason a rational person would prolong their own life is because they believe that what comes after might not be as good for them.

And yet, when I tell people with "faith" that I'm an atheist, they seem horrified - less at the idea that I might be pissing off their imaginary omnipotent, and more because they can't imagine someone living without faith in an afterlife. "What do you think happens after you die?" they say, eyes wide with shock, as if I've just suggested that an infant's ribcage makes excellent footwear. And my answer is, nothing. Nothing happens. You die. That's it. And honestly, I don't think that's remotely a bad thing.

You're free from the horrors - the legitimate horrors - of the real world. You don't have to worry about living acceptably, and you don't need to impress anybody. There's no vague goal to strive for. There are no empty promises. It's just over. You're done. You're set. Why does that scare people?

My contemplation of suicide is not born of depression, but of rationalism. I don't get enough out of life to make it worthwhile to put anything in. I'm a drain on resources, and I contribute nothing that could not easily be contributed by someone else. It would probably be better for everyone, including me, if I wasn't around. It would be simpler.

Why haven't I done it yet? Well... part of it is fear of pain. I'm worried I'll make a mistake and survive, but in even worse condition than before. I'm worried that it'll take a long time to end, or that there'll be several excruciating moments before it all goes dull.

But most of all, I see all these people in the world who seem to enjoy their lives, and I want to believe that there's a reason for it. Every day, at least seven billion people go to sleep hoping they'll wake up again. I don't understand it, but I accept that they may be right and I may be wrong. I have yet to find any purpose in my life, but that doesn't mean it isn't there.

How about you? Why do you stick around? What's your meaning?

I want to know that such a thing exists.

[Freack]

I do not need a purpose.

I feel happy, and there are still things to look forward to everyday. There does not need to be an overarching PLAN to everything. Every night I go to sleep thinking about the people I care about, and what there is that I can learn tomorrow.

There is this idea of "winning" but in my experience nobody in your real actual life is going to judge you to that standard. Are you moderately helpful to your fellow man and not a complete jackass? YOU WIN!

You are not really supposed to any any great thing. You sit around, eat some food, do some stuff and then you die. And that is that. And the world goes on unchanged.

But that is okay. You need to make your own meaning in this life. Sure, there is bad stuff. Look at the small joys in life. And appreciate them. I cannot tell you why you should appreciate life.

But for me, if I was not around I would never know how Homestuck ends. I would never go to another sleep over. I would never eat one more slice of pie. I would miss my family. And the chance to go back to school. I would miss the taste of coffee at three in the morning. And the feel of a freshly vacuumed carpet. I would miss making fun of late night infomercials with my dad. I would miss helping my sister with math. I would miss looking forward to birthdays. I would miss the smell of rain. I would miss losing at MarioKart. I would miss my forums friends. I would miss my meatspace friends.

I stick around for that.

[ThereWillBePayne]

So this is a lot, but I think it expresses my understanding fully.

Anon, the reason for me to continue is not because I find something in my life that drives me. I mean if you look at anything close enough it ceases making sense. We live on a sphere of rock and water hurtling at hundreds of millions of kilometers a second away from an explosion in the centre of the universe. Our lives are lived in social orders where the majority of the time we constrain our behaviors, impulses and needs in order to co-exist with these other people who behave similarly. All this is because over time just by acting this way we've built up some sort of behavioral rule set for ourselves, constrained by cultural evolution. Our education is being told to remember and repeat facts, so rarely now do they test our competency, and if you look at even closer, we're making marks with bits of graphite and ink on square pieces of pulped vegetation, and this will somehow significantly determine the rest of our life. Even looking further than that, we cannot determine whether anything is real beyond ourselves, because our senses are fallible and our brains have the ability to imagine things.

So what you do, is you don't look at these things closely. I'm not suggesting "ignorance is bliss", I'm saying that if you focus on the small bits and try to procure some logic, some order of reason and control from it, you'll lose your fricken mind. That's why we need fantasies to exist, so that we can create some sort of order, some sort of control and goal, because even if it's not real, it provides us with a thread of something greater, something much more illusive, that we know if we follow far enough, will lead to great things.

But when you see society as broken, as people being nothing more than "sheep" (pardon the angst rebellious teen catchphrase please), you don't become the cynic, you become the Sheppard. The ability to recognize these as problems, to think critically about society, is not something everyone has or chooses to use. So when you see these problems, consider it a challenge to do better, to move towards making it right, because otherwise you've given up before you've even started. For example, people talk about the vastness of the universe and how insignificant we are, and it's supposed to make us feel better because we understand the little things that worry us so much, in the big picture, are nothing, but I don't see it that way. Because if you think of things like that, then you've decided everything you do is meaningless, and it's not. The universe can go fuck itself, what you're doing, here, now, is more important that all the orbiting spheres of nuclear gas if can throw at you. It's not a reassurance, it's a challenge. The universe is your playing field, and it's waiting for you to show it up, to prove that you can significantly fuck shit up.

Overall, it's not about accepting the limitations of society and the problems; it's about transcending the mundane. If you feel that's all there is to it, don't resign yourself to your lot, or give up and squander your understanding and talent, aim to do better, to find something more than what you can see. I recommend you get help, not so you can reintegrate into this world you feel is bringing you down, but to enable yourself to rise up from the world, not to some threshold of happiness society and the universe expects of you, but to be better than that. This universe, this world, this society, all flawed, are the playing field, the challenges and all you have to do is chose to be the Sheppard of these misguided sheep, not the cynic. Step up to the challenge.

[Milskidasith]

I'm going to assume by the fact there was a question at the end that I've got free reign to actually, well, discuss this, and I'm going to dissect it a bit.

This world is not one I particularly like living in. It's a world of celebrity worship, where people - ordinary, everyday people - are idolized and deified by other ordinary everyday people for trivial accomplishments. I support the idea of praising someone who deserves it, but tabloid magazines? Celeb dating? Look at that clusterfuck surrounding the Royal Wedding a year or so back. Fame, and the pursuit of it, are poisoning the common human. Social standards instill goals that we might not otherwise have. People are told that success means Doctor, or Movie Star, or Bestseller, or Talk Show Host. People are told that if you don't win, you lose. And so we strive for success at all costs, including - especially - at the cost of someone else's success. It's a cutthroat world and it doesn't need to be. The people who succeed end up standing for an ideal, or standing in the way. They become either idols or effigies.

Celebrity worship part: Meh. If it fulfills people to hugely care about them, or watch it for the spectacle of it, it doesn't really matter. While there are some people who truly want fame, there are a lot of people who just want to have a good life in some way, and to make sure that they're stable. The world's not fair about who gets what, and I'll admit culture may not present real life accurately, but nothing, not even a description of my life, can present real life accurately for anybody (except for myself). I've never found a "if you're not a winner, you're a loser" attitude to be true for anybody around me, and "especially" at the cost of other people is a misnomer, unless you know people who actually go out of their way to cut other people down for success.

People who don't make it that far tend to make it just as far as they are able to. They dream of fame, they dream of the recognition they feel they deserve. Maybe they do deserve it. It's that kind of world. Katy Perry sings five minutes worth of music, hands it off to an audio engineer to make it sound better, and then rakes in millions of dollars. A fireman who risked his life for others in the wake of the 9/11 attacks dies of a preventable illness because he couldn't afford medication - the fund set up for heroes like him having been shut down by politicians looking for a way to spend more money on bombs and bullets and campaign ads.

Entertainers get paid a lot, yes. It's not really fair, but why care? Even further, they actually *do* get paid what society says they're worth (which is how money works), because people will pay for music or experiences they can look back on fondly. The politics stuff is unfortunate, yes, but the fireman did sign on for those types of risks when he took the job, and the constant use of the tragedy there as a talking point seems as crass as not caring; there are probably plenty of firemen suffering similar diseases who just happened to rescue people from a regular burning building, which is the job they signed up for, and they're not being made into an excuse for politicians being awful.

People who recognize the dichotomy, or who have the potential to, are distracted by a constantly-blaring message of "Everything is okay." TV commercials are filled with smiling, happy people. Movies have happy endings. Things get resolved in our worlds of fiction. And of course, we're constantly being handed little fragments of entertainment, anything that will fill the empty spaces in our lives, provided by people who want money of their own to fulfill their dreams of fame and fortune. Luxuries are everything. People who don't have them are pitied. People who have plenty of them are adored and envied. Messages of equality are heeded and agreed with, until the time comes where one might actually have to give up something they own - it's a nice idea on paper, but no one wants to cut themselves down so another can rise up.

So advertisements and feel-good movies (there is plenty of depressing media, especially in literature, that you seem to ignore) try to make people feel good, and advertisements try to make a materialistic culture. That doesn't mean it's the same for everybody, in fact; you seem to treat the message of what the media says as the same as people think. Personally, money and luxuries are nice, but it's not the most important thing, and surveys on happiness can show that money isn't everything. While yes, people pity those who don't have enough to live with and envy those with more, that doesn't mean that everybody believes all poor people are miserable and all rich people are happy. As for equality: Plenty of people don't actually want "equality" at all, for various political reasons, and I can agree with that on some point, but that's basically an economic politics issue.

Work leads to work. School leads to school. You have to spend money to make money, and then you spend more of that money to get an even larger sum. In theory. Students look for a job so they can afford tuition, tuition that they hope will lead to meaningful education, that will in turn lead to meaningful employment. Where's the end goal? Retirement? Sitting in a nursing home, having somebody feed you soup while you reminisce about the good old days when things you liked were relevant? Or is it middle age, where you've hit the sweet spot of your career or are moving steadily toward it? The time where you're making enough money to keep yourself happy, to distract yourself from the world's injustice, and if only you had the free time to enjoy it because your high-paying job takes so much effort to stay on top of? People say the college segments are the best years of anyone's lives, but how can that be possible when they're "supposed" to be spent preparing for the future?

It's all about the journey, and being happy in the now. Just because you're prepping for the future doesn't mean that you can't be having fun now; to use a terrible analogy, all of Homestuck is a buildup to the climax, but that doesn't mean it's meaningless until then. The point of most things is to learn, so you can live a fulfilled live, and to do something you enjoy and make enough money to be comfortable, because up to a certain point money is necessary in order to survive, and for a bit after that, to have the luxuries you really want to maintain. If you think of every day as meaningless except in preparation for something else, you'll be pretty badly off, because it's really a mental thing.

Friends can be a part of it. Romance can be a part of it. But in a world where everyone is out for themselves, how can you honestly trust others? It's nice in television and movies, again, where the protagonist has a crisis of conscience, a metaphorical blue screen of death, and their friends pull them out of it. But that doesn't happen in real life. People see you staring into space and sulking, and they figure you're just having a rough day. They hear you asking for help, but don't realize it goes beyond simple whining and small talk. You have fun times together, but when all's said and done, people change. They drift apart. Sometimes literally. You move away for work or school and never see your old friends again. Or when you do, their priorities have changed. It's nice to meet an old friend for dinner again, but it will never be like it was. You're forgotten.

Actually, friends have talked me out of being unhappy in real life! People do care. Even more importantly, they don't have to care for you to be happy. I'm not even joking. The concept of absolutely needing deep, true friends who are with you through everything is something the media has made up. Personally, I love my friends, and hanging out is great, but I don't feel the need to share everything with a lot of them, and they don't share everything with me, and I'm still happy! Some people may not want friends at all, and some may really want those deep connections, but that's a personal thing. There's also the fact that you expect friends to have some psychic ability to tell when things are serious; it's not their fault if you don't tell them it's serious and you want their help.

Family works the same way. Society likes to pretend that there's an invisible bond tying everyone together simply because they're related, but that's not true at all. It's another lie perpetuated by the same people who like to ignore the world's faults. It prevents people from actually working to maintain relationships, because when something goes wrong, no one is willing to admit it's their problem. A mother won't admit that she sees her children as a job and a responsibility more than as living beings. A father won't admit that he's been too distant to have any impact on his kids' development, because he's too busy talking about all the work he does to put a roof over their heads and food on their table. Siblings are told that they'll always be there for each other, but no one ever utters the truth, which is that it only happens "when it's convenient."

Pretty much all families know this. So what? Yeah, family is a responsibility in many respects, but just because most feel-good media doesn't show a dysfunctional, hate filled family doesn't mean that people don't know it exists. You can find plenty of examples of more "realistic" families in literature, but it's all dependent on the family, and in the end, everybody pretty much knows that family is just people you've had to spend years and years with, and because of that you've probably got at least some attachment to it.

The perfect world, the happily ever after, the light at the end of the tunnel, is a lie.

Happily ever after is a fantasy because the real world isn't a story with a beginning or end; everything is a whole bunch of middles. That doesn't mean happiness can't exist.

I don't see a point to it all. There are some wonders in the world, and there are some fun times to be had, but is the cost really worth it? The question is often asked, why are we here? And while some interpret it to be a question of the origin of our existence, I see it as more about the continuation of our existence. Why are we STILL here? There's no way to "win." Friendship is fleeting. In the end, everyone dies alone, and one day each and every one of us will be forgotten, and our contributions to the world as a whole will be meaningless.

I don't believe the people who claim to have faith in a positive afterlife. If you really think you'll be better off after you die, why do you continue to live? The only reason a rational person would prolong their own life is because they believe that what comes after might not be as good for them.

And yet, when I tell people with "faith" that I'm an atheist, they seem horrified - less at the idea that I might be pissing off their imaginary omnipotent, and more because they can't imagine someone living without faith in an afterlife. "What do you think happens after you die?" they say, eyes wide with shock, as if I've just suggested that an infant's ribcage makes excellent footwear. And my answer is, nothing. Nothing happens. You die. That's it. And honestly, I don't think that's remotely a bad thing.

You're free from the horrors - the legitimate horrors - of the real world. You don't have to worry about living acceptably, and you don't need to impress anybody. There's no vague goal to strive for. There are no empty promises. It's just over. You're done. You're set. Why does that scare people?

My contemplation of suicide is not born of depression, but of rationalism. I don't get enough out of life to make it worthwhile to put anything in. I'm a drain on resources, and I contribute nothing that could not easily be contributed by someone else. It would probably be better for everyone, including me, if I wasn't around. It would be simpler.

Why haven't I done it yet? Well... part of it is fear of pain. I'm worried I'll make a mistake and survive, but in even worse condition than before. I'm worried that it'll take a long time to end, or that there'll be several excruciating moments before it all goes dull.

But most of all, I see all these people in the world who seem to enjoy their lives, and I want to believe that there's a reason for it. Every day, at least seven billion people go to sleep hoping they'll wake up again. I don't understand it, but I accept that they may be right and I may be wrong. I have yet to find any purpose in my life, but that doesn't mean it isn't there.

How about you? Why do you stick around? What's your meaning?

I want to know that such a thing exists.

I'm going to reply to these as a group. First, we'll ignore the religion thing, though you should still study religion to get a better idea if you honestly don't even recognize that for most religions, killing yourself is a sin that's near universally guaranteed to cause you to go to hell/reincarnate in a worse state.

Anyway, ignoring religion: You're going to die at some point. Everything you've done, everyone who knew you existed, will eventually be destroyed as well. Maybe if you had a profound impact on certain people, they'll think about you for the rest of your life. Maybe if you impacted the national or world stage, you'll be remembered, gradually less and less, in history books and museums, but eventually all those will disappear. Eventually, even the physical evidence you existed will be almost entirely gone, as the Earth is destroyed, and even further after that, the entire universe will succumb to heat death, or a big crunch, or something else. No matter how you act in this life, eventually you will be forgotten, and even if you're remembered after you die, it doesn't matter that much because you're dead.

And yet, even with the fact that any given accomplishment will be washed away, there's still beauty. People are still happy; people still have friendship; people still create; people still help others; people still philosophize; people still try. Even you, in your nihilism, are still in some way trying to make things better when it really doesn't matter. Some people look for meaning, but most people, myself included, just look for happiness as its own reward; that's all the meaning I need. I don't need a grand meaning or a purpose; I just enjoy life, I enjoy the feeling of improving myself and trying to help others, I enjoy the things my brain has been hard wired to enjoy, and while I plan for the future, I try to enjoy the present and stay happy. Meaning is meaningless. Because the life isn't a story, there can't be any grand theme or true ending you can work towards; you can just make the best of of everything as is, in whatever way you can. And honestly, there's more beauty in that than in any story.

[aPawnAscending]

Ok, I'm actually a little scared to reply to this post but here I go anyway.
I cannot let myself go off and die when I have friends and family counting on me. If I were to go, their lives would get entirely fucked up in the process. It would be absolutely devastating for them to hear that I will not be returning home and all the improvement and healing they've had over the last couple years would be undone. I don't want to be responsible for having things spiral down into a pit of despair on their end with my death. Also, I'd still like to be with them. I understand that I would technically not care in the oblivion of a non-afterlife since I would not exist enough to care anyway, but.... RIGHT NOW, I still want to be with them again and that's all that matters.
Life isn't something that you "win" by "climbing to the top" and plenty people understand that. A lot of people I know are not caught up in frivolous stuff like celebrity gossip anyway, and no a perfect would can never be achieved. Perfection is an impossibility, and would be a bit boring anyway. Don't get caught up with this big picture stuff. Instead, focus on your own personal journey through life. Carve out your own adventure through it. As an atheist, you are inclined to believe you only have one (though even with other beliefs, I would still urge that you treat this life as your only one), so why waste it and skip to the end (which is an inevitable end that'll you'll be awarded anyway).
The bonds between family and friends are not lies. It's more than enough to keep me going. I'm so into supporting them that they've had to turn me down a few times because I was willing to keep support to my own detriment. Altruism is a thing that exists (even if it may have self serving motives (I have to say I enjoy helping others, so I cannot say I help people without getting something out of it...))

Anyways, it would appear that your concept of how relationships work seems to be heavily painted in an idealistic light and your disappointment for deviance is that much more for it. Understand that nothing will be perfect. Even my very close friends aren't like those "best friends that know everything about you before you do and knows all your moods all the time" you see a lot in television and books, and my family has had numerous of their own issues while I was growing up. I've had to get outside help on more than one occasion, and the emotional wounds inflicted from those times are only now beginning to heal. I still love them to death, and am not willing to skip to the end and miss out on them. Same with my friends.

Honestly, I don't know if there's any purpose to life or not. I've ceased really caring for that answer either way. If there's a purpose to all this and we are supposed to do stuff, great, if not, also great. Either way, you carve out your own adventure whether by illusion or design. As...pointless...as it seems a lot of times, it's just even more pointless to skip ahead. You don't get much from skipping ahead.

I'm tired and feel I botched this pretty badly. Anyways, carve out your own meaning in life. Death can wait. Death is a friend that I look forward to greeting one day too, but not any time soon. Too busy with this life thing.

[dialecticBlight]

There's only one thing, really, that drives me forward to live on every single day and that little thing is spite.

Celebrity worship, complete ignorance of the bystanders as to all of the issues going on in the world, people being assholes to each other regularly, people making each others' lives a living hell, completely meaningless and frivolous violence and bloodshed and arguing and cheating and lying and stealing... None of that's really a surprise to me any more. You get jaded to it after a while. The world's a sucky place and barely anybody ever really ends up coming together and actively asking "how can we make it better?" There may be a few patches of light here and there - not to be predictable but Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. are both two very well-known examples of what humanity can do if pushed to it - but overall there's this prolonged sense of hopelessness, pointlessness, and futility that surrounds much of daily life.

That's not to say that it's totally futile, per se. Humanity could - emphasis on that - achieve amazing and spectacular things, but all in all a microscopic minority ever bothers to go forward and see their potential realized. It's mostly just a bunch of lazy jerks who go and sit on their arses all day while once in a decade someone manages to achieve great things and make the world a better place, only to have everything they do be forgotten in a few years. If everyone managed to achieve their potential and become great people, I have no doubt that the world would be a far far better place where things would get done rationally and consistently. But point is, mathematically speaking, that's never going to happen - if there was a 2% chance of anyone ever truly becoming a great person, then it'd take odds that would make Vriska faint to make even 50% of the population genuinely decent and upstanding.

But it's also good to remember that many of the people who would never care about your existence, and would never acknowledge anything you did, and think you're a subhuman being to be thrown away at their leisure, are genuinely horrible people. There's no shame in acknowledging that monsters will be monsters - and in fact, if someone awful decides that the best thing you could do would be to just off yourself or go away and stop being a bother to everyone, the best thing to do would be to ignore them and go on and succeed and fulfill your potential in spite of them. Even if you do fail, it'd be better than letting that attitude rule your entire life while you failed to stand up for yourself.

Is this a really cynical way of looking at life and success? Yeah, but then again, not all of us are truly cut out to be tried-and-true optimists, and some of us can't just magically wave a freaking wand and suddenly think the world's some sugar bowl, and have their skipping and singing cure cancer, go back in time, and kill Hitler. The world's not a perfect place. The world has actual problems, with only a minority of the population ever achieving anything close to true happiness lasting more than a few days in their life, and so many awful people and even more awful crimes perpetually exist that it makes the average mustache-twirling supervillain from Marvel look like a saint.

This advice may not work for everyone, but I figure I owe it to myself and to all of the jackasses out there to succeed and rise up despite what the odds tell me and despite the fact that some guy decides I won't accomplish anything. Whether I go down fighting to achieve or whether I go down having made the world a genuinely better place, the very people who wanted me to shut up and lie down forever will be responsible for my strive towards doing some good. And regardless of the circumstances which caused my downfall, whether good or ill, at least I can die knowing that I stood up for myself and what I believed and had faith in, with my parting gifts to the world being my absence, my legacy (small or large as it may be), and one final middle finger to everyone and everything who said I couldn't make a difference.

[ThereWillBePayne]

Hell yeah man, that's what I'm talking about.
(Side note)
So often people forget that it's not about sides, whether you're sticking it to the man or sticking with the man, sometimes you're going to do better than just picking a side, you're going to better than both sides and stick it to all of them. (I'm not advocating some form of misanthrophy though, just defying expectations.)
In fact the bifurcation we see in the world really pisses me off, there's just no tolerance for things we don't like or aren't the same as us. It's like people are acting more and more like teenagers, we all want to look like and act like teens, and we seem compelled to find groups and attack the opposites. It's just so... juvinile, like we can do better, but we don't want to bother. It's moral and mental laziness, and it really irks me that people are so comfortable to adopt positions of ignorance and amass in groups of ignorance rather than think and discover and become more than they are, more than we currently understand to be possible.

[Graknorke]

Eh, honestly, I would be having all of these feelings, but I'm pretty sure I've installed a mechanism by which any fucks I may have otherwise given, do not get given. In fact, the only thing that's particularly worried me is the nature of how little I care. Compare this to getting D and Es in multiple GCSE tests (Not final ones, but I only have 1 which won't have to be submitted in total) where I still don't care enough to try harder to study or anything. It just kind of feels like it's something insignificant, and something far more important is there, but I never actually have a thing more important that I'm focusing on.
Empathy/sympathy are totally shot too, people can go on about how their dog died or how their sister is stuck in hospital or whatever, but I have to keep myself from reminding them how little I care about my own problems, nevermind theirs. Were emotion a simple scale of -100 to 100, I would be sitting within 20 or so of -10 all the time. It's just difficult to get excited or particularly disappointed in anything. I don't really know how to put it better than that.

It's almost like there's the morals-and-feeling part of my mind that gets shot down by a part that is just below my consciousness. It gets somewhat infuriating sometimes, when I know I should be doing X but I feel no compelling drive to do it. I have nobody to dissapoint who won't forgive me, I have nobody to spite and I have nobody whose stance towards me could be changed at all positively by my actions. My driving emotion is probably frustration and curiousity (If that's an emotion), except the curiousity never GETS anywhere, I just want to know whatever then I'm perfectly content to do fuck-all again. And frustration isn't a very good motivator. I have no desire to be better than anyone else strong enough, nor to prove anything to anyone, nor to prove anything to myself.

Wow, emotional vomit all up in here. Sorry about that.

EDIT: Come to think of it, I DO have a driving emotion, and it's amusement. Problem is that things that are good and sensible tend to not be amusing.

[Neophyte Bluegaze]

How about you? Why do you stick around? What's your meaning?

I want to know that such a thing exists.

I think everyone understands, to varying extents, what it is like to be without a purpose; I say this to empathize with you, for I too have had many problems with this in the past, but I know that having others that go through the same thing may not necessarily be what you want. However, in my own life, I believe there is indeed a life after death, but that doesn't make me want to get there any sooner merely because I know that there has got to be a reason I'm here. Not necessarily a specific one, but one that I, myself, will discover. For me, I try to remember that the destination may be great, but the journey can be great and is very important, perhaps even more so important than the destination itself. In this case, the destination is either nothingness, heaven, or numerous other ideas/places that have been discussed for centuries. In your case, you say that you would prefer nothingness to everyday life, and I too once wished for nothingness in my life. I wanted to just stop. Stop being alive, stop being around people, stop thinking. I wanted nothing more than to be suspended in... nothing. But the problem with that is I can't change anything if I've just stopped; I would be leaving behind numerous people that will no longer be affected by my presence. I see life as a wonderful opportunity to try and do something positive. There are many other people out there that feel the same way, but I do not think that really makes one person less meaningful than any other. I have seen myself a failure for the majority of my life, but even so I knew there were people around me whom I could do things for. In this position, I am able to do things that no one else can do, because they are not me. If I were gone, nobody could fill in for me as a son to my parents or a friend. Nobody can replace anyone for this very reason; we are all individuals and we are where we are for a reason because we make a reason to be where we are.

I find it interesting, however, how much your situation reminds me of how I felt; however, in my case I was wholly upset with myself, and in your case you are upset with both society and yourself. Basically, I didn't start to change at all until I admitted maybe I'm not as bad a person as I thought. I'm not saying that you should do the same (if you should even desire to) and I'm not saying you need to, either, but after doing so, I have begun to discover that my meaning to myself on this earth is to make people happy. I have something, something that everyone else has but does not always utilize (ie. some of those celebrities you mentioned) and I can do something with it. I can make my friends smile. I can act. I can think. I am different, and that is what makes this unoriginal attribute of being alive unique in me.

[garrulousMonolith]

@anonCombatant (clever name.)
I guess what drives me is curiosity.
Yes, the world sucks. You're right. I've learned that too. People are lying to themselves if they think there's a happy ending, because no one's ever come back and told us what the only ending we know of is like.
Maybe to die would be a great adventure. Maybe even better than living, especially with all the shit we put up with on this crapsack planet, including each other! But I don't know if it is, because I haven't learned everything about this one yet. I'm not the kind of person to make a decision without all the information if I can help it, and sometimes not even then. So I'm still here because there's so much I still don't know and haven't experienced, and so much that I could. As long as there's something new on the oh-so-cliched horizon, I'm gonna keep heading for it.

Ultimately, I think this all boils down to the fact that there are two ways to go after you realize that there's no real point to doing anything.
Either you ask yourself, "Why do anything?" or you ask yourself, "Why not do everything?"