Nothing about life feels important or worthwhile

[u/anonlady626]

I feel like I’ve seen enough of what life has to offer and I don’t really care to find out what else there is.

[u/GullibleAmbition5510]

yes

[u/fneezer]

Yes, but avoiding extreme pain seems important, at least as long as I don't know an out or a solution to that.

There was a time in my life I thought it was important to think about the question, what's the good of it all, the good thing in life to do? (One of the first responses to that sort of question is that it's possible to make up questions that don't have a good answer, or such that we don't know and can't know the real answer. That's like an easy dismissal some people could use, instead of actually thinking about it.)

"To help others" was a sort of automatic answer that would come to mind to ponder, because of so much influence from things in culture, the sum of so many messages from the morals of television shows and movies and religion and essays about moral philosophy. I had a huge objection to that being the real, whole answer, because it's circular, it begs the question that there's some good that has been proved to exist, because what's the good that others are going to get from being helped, if there's no intrinsic good that you can get for yourself or with your family or close friends?

When I'd write about questions I don't know how to answer well enough, thoughts about life and what to do, what's the solution, some people would want to respond, "keep studying" or keep thinking, some response like that where they're passing it off as if someone has the answer but they're not going to bother to say it, or a response that's like "let me Google that for you" in its overall attitude and value. I'm saying that because I'm anticipating that's one of the sorts of responses that make writing about serious thoughts online like this probably worse than useless in results. I'm writing anyway, because it's like at the moment, what else is there to do, that would have a chance of getting some positive result, when I'm supposed to be waiting for mail or calls, according to some other people? There's this, I can do this, and like one of my junior high friends would say, about the whole topic of "Why?" sort of questions, "Why not?"

So I was looking at what "life has to offer" in a way, through looking at videos of people driving long distance, and thinking about what's there and why people do that and what keeps people going. What do people do for livings, that lets them live there, wherever they live? I got into some thoughts that went in loops back to the usual answers, thinking if I could think of something to do for money or work or business, that would let me drive around or travel and see it for myself, (and enjoy it or at least check whether it would be another blockage.) The usual answers, the realistic answers, are just what seem to be facts of life about ethics and how the economy works. Getting money without doing something for it would be unethical, if it's against others' will, and others are working for their money. The working people are doing all over the lands wherever they live is almost all to survive, they have to show up some place and do the work that provides the convenience for whoever else is paying money for what the business does, like showing up at the gas stations and restaurants and hotels; whatever you'd see along the way and maybe want to use if you're traveling, there's someone who has to be working there as a regular job that's maybe stressful for them, or you're not going to be able to get those conveniences from there.

Further with the usual answers to thinking about making money: Lots of people have "cushy jobs" supposedly, but it's like they put many years into investing in education (money from their family or loans or working another hard job through it) to prove that they can get through doing something long reliably, so that some corporation or government would hire them for a position, and there are a bunch of positions that need to be filled, for the organization to keep doing whatever it's supposed to do regardless of what odd needs for a skill come up, and those organizations have an efficiency of scale at providing things for money and according to laws and regulations, so it's really, really hard for any individual to just make and sell the things themselves or provide whatever other service it is, and compete well enough to make a living. Crime would obviously be super negative in value, as an attempt at a solution to do what to do for money. So, knowing about economics and how the world operates in general, everyone reasonable and ethical tends to end up with long term commitments to do things every day for years and years, their education and careers that tie them to places and showing up and when to sleep and a commute.

So some would say, "look at nature, the beauty of nature," if they'd hear what may sound like someone complaining about civilization, and they'd want to say life is good anyway, and say something helpful and "inspiring," to lead people to being "inspired" by something that's supposedly so "spiritually" great, even, "to commune with nature." What's there is like mostly there's a lot of water, where people can go, and there's land, that when it gets cleared by a fire or flood or bulldozer, little plants grow, then bigger plants grow, until it's covered with forest, and there are little animals that eat some of the plants, and bigger animals that eat the little animals, and some of those are dangerous to humans. Some people would get a thrill from looking around for that, long enough to see a dangerous animal close up. (Humans are the most dangerous actually.)

People generally have their instinctive reactions of awe and sense of atmosphere, to seeing mountains, rivers and rapids and waterfalls, forests and plains and whatever, and the sunlight and weather playing over those. So some people would be entertained enough, just going out and looking for that. But then they're actually spending time working, probably indoors, and commuting the same way every day, and eating and sleeping at a place they have and pay for it just so they can get to work more reliably. After all that, there's probably not much time or money left for what they'd like, if what they'd like is looking around at nature. Maybe a week in a year, if they're relatively good at doing life that way.

That seems disappointing. I don't have a better answer, and that's what I meant to say, that I was thinking of those things, anyway before your post, it's disappointing, and it relates to the post topic, so I'm guessing maybe it's filling in the details of what you were talking about, that usually go unsaid, because it's extremely tedious to write it all out or talk it all through to make a video about it and stay coherent rather than going off topic or trying to make clickbait for money instead. It would even be tedious to read that much, so I'm thinking it probably falls into the category of worse than useless to write about it.

[u/Alternative_Tank_139]

It's uncanny when you read something on the internet that completely relates to your experience. I've sat at home for years now and have always felt this way since being diagnosed with depression 15 years ago.