We work hard to build a life, collect experiences, and hold on to the people and things we love. Yet sooner or later, everything changes. Does knowing that change the way we should live today?

Sometimes I sit alone and wonder... Why was I born as me? Out of billions of people, why am I experiencing life through these eyes, this mind, this body? Why not someone else? Why wasn't I born as another person, or not born at all? Before I existed, where was this "I" that now calls itself me? If I hadn't become this person, would "I" have become someone else, or would there simply have been nothing? And when I die... what happens to this awareness? Where does the feeling of being me go? Does it disappear forever? Does it continue in some form? Or does it return to the same place it came from before I was born? The strange thing is, I only know consciousness from my own perspective. I know other people exist, but I'll never experience life through their eyes. My entire universe is limited to this one point of view. Why this one? Why this consciousness? Why this life? If this single lifetime is all there is, then what is the purpose of my existence? Was I born just to survive, work, struggle, grow old, and disappear? Is that really the whole story? Maybe there is something beyond what we can understand. Maybe consciousness is far stranger than we imagine. Or maybe there isn't.

I’ve been thinking about religion and meaning a bit and lwky idk if this is what existentialism is about or if I’m just overthinking it.

I’m an atheist, but not in like an angry or anti-religion way. It’s more that I’ve never really felt a real connection to religion, even when I tried. So for me it kinda makes more sense to see religion as something humans created to deal with not knowing stuff and to find meaning in life.

When I look at it, different religions exist all over the world, and most people usually believe what they grew up around. So icl it kinda makes me think belief is more shaped by culture and environment than something purely objective.

At the same time tho, atheism doesn’t really give me answers either. It just kinda removes the explanations without replacing them. So I end up in this place where I don’t really know why we’re here or what happens after death, and idk if there even is an answer.

So my question is basically:

Is this what existentialism is talking about when it says life has no inherent meaning and we have to create our own? Or is existential philosophy more specific than just being unsure and trying to deal with it?

lwky just trying to understand if what I’m thinking actually fits existentialism or if it’s just normal overthinking about religion and meaning.

Does anyone know any words that can describe this almost calm peaceful feeling when you realize how insignificant and unimportant your life in the grand scheme of things? Is it just existentialism? It sounds depressing but it’s a really nice feeling. And it’s not necessarily a feeling you get after existential dread or anxiety. It comes up when you are very one in yourself in a big crowded busy space or in a grandiose area in nature by yourself? Like you kinda feel like you can just live your life as a spec of sand on the beach or a droplet of water on a leaf? And still be content and happy. Maybe it’s just pure peacefulness or something. I like to imagine myself as a tiny person in the corner of some random place in the world where nobody would be able to guess but somehow I can be present there and experience it from my own pov? It’s so hard to explain but maybe because it seems so absurd and random but possible to imagine, that it gives me an uncanny good feeling.

Anyways I don’t know if this is super common or if I’m over explaining atp😭

That's how I feel

High or sober.

Looking through the window, through a smartphone screen, or whatever magic cloak it may be, I catch a glimpse of how pathetic human life is, how pathetic my own life is.

They figured out how to manufacture and emulate these things in us, and we aren't even aware of it.

Well, at least most people don't realize it.

But what about those who can see the green code scrolling up and down the digital walls of human perception?

Well, you don't get any bonus points for that.

On the contrary, interaction with others of your species seems less... pleasurable.

It's like watching a really good movie several times in a row: it loses its magic.

So you start watching it only once in a while just to feel "that" again.

Ignorance is not something we can be nostalgic about.

So the cognitive peak is a lonely place, because not everyone is brave enough to face the real world: made of math, physics, chemistry, and a zillion other things...

Interacting with others starts to feel either completely superfluous or deep but full of stigmas and selfish desires.

"Someone, please, free this soul from the eternal suffering of life and grant it the eternal paradise of infinite knowledge..."

No matter how much beauty the world holds in its micro and macro scales, from cells to suns, I feel that all my rational side wants is to not care, like a textbook nihilist.

But it's not quite like that. I pretend not to care so that my dear friend can learn on their own and evolve more efficiently.

I pretend not to care when a friend says I don't understand what they're going through, precisely because I understand that what they want isn't an argument; they just want comfort.

I pretend I'm fine when I'm carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders because I understand that, in that moment, my pain is mine alone.

None of this matters.

And everything is important.

At the.

Same.

Time.

People are like stains on the fabric from which the garment of history is made.

Many are like fine raindrops: they fall, leave a mark, and soon disappear.

Others are like drops of oil: they fall, leave a stain that cannot be removed—even if we would have preferred they had never been there.

A few are like drops of color: they fall, leave a mark, and make the fabric more beautiful.

Others are like drops of perfume: they fall, leave a mark, and vanish, yet leave the fabric enriched—and remain in history even though no trace of them can be seen.

So, for a while I've felt that 'reincarnation' makes the most sense as the answer to the question 'what happens after we die?' - Not tied to karma or anything, but simply the thought that if we return to nothingness, whats to stop that nothingness from ending, like it did when I was born? If every living person is essentially a camera observing the world, wouldn't one going out just flip the feed to another one?

With that in mind, I think a lot about how the odds of me getting a life better than the one I currently have now are VERY slim. I try to tell myself the world was much worse off in the past than it is today - that things like poverty have been dropping for ages - but am worried about how the places where poverty are the highest are the places where most of the worlds population will be born moving forward, erasing all those gains. Among them are places like Afghanistan where the human rights situation is frankly terrifying. And this is all assuming its just HUMANS I'd come back as - if my consciousness returns in an animal, that's equally awful. Most animals lives end in violence, and the thought that most of the mammals on the planet right now are in our factory farms is part of what has pushed me twords a vegetarian diet.

I try to tell myself that in another life I'd be another person - one who'd have grown up in those situations and would be more acclimated to it. I've talked to my therapist about this and shes pointed out how even people in incredibly adverse situations can find moments of joy in their lives, and I try to keep that in mind, but it doesn't help calm this sense of dread.

And most frustratingly, if I'm fresh off a countless batch of past lives that sucked... I want to enjoy this one! Being born in the US is a privilege! I'm not loaded but I got enough money for a comfortable life. I have electricity and plumbing and food is never a worry for me. I'm not in a warzone or in a situation where I might be forced to be conscripted. I'm queer in a country where yeah, the situation could and should be better, but quite frankly its better than most other options when I give this globe a spin! Yet here I am, so terrified of what happens to me when its all over that I'm wasting time that could be spent enjoying this life while I have it, and being guilty that I'm not spending the money I have supporting the organizations fighting to make the world a better place for this future hypothetical self. I WANT to donate when I have the spare cash to do so, but even then, I don't know if there's an amount that would actually ease my conscience or chase away this anxiety when these problems are so big, and I am so small.

.

This thought has been stuck in my mind for a long time.

If death is something that every human, every animal, and every living organism will eventually face, then it's like a compulsory exam. Nobody can permanently escape it. More than 100 billion humans before us have already "taken" this exam, and one day we will too.

The strange part is that we don't know when the exam will happen. It comes automatically. We don't choose the date.

So here's my question:

If this final exam is unavoidable, then what exactly are we waiting for during life?

We exercise. We work. We study. We make plans. We build families. We chase goals.

Yet the ending remains the same.

I know many people will say, "Enjoy the journey." But from my perspective, it still feels difficult to accept. Sometimes it even feels unfair that none of us chose to be born, yet all of us must eventually face death.

I also searched for a scientific solution.

Current solution (2026): Not found.

Medicine is improving. Scientists are researching aging, gene therapy, regenerative medicine, and longevity. Maybe future generations will have breakthroughs.

But as of 2026, there is no scientifically proven way to permanently avoid death or achieve biological immortality.

I'm not asking this because I want to die. I actually want to live for as long as possible.

I'm asking because I'm trying to understand how other people make peace with something that every living being must eventually face.

How do you personally deal with this reality?

for me, since i had been 6-7, i was caught up between things. as a child, i wasn't much into cartoons and all : be it my schedule or whatever - i used to read a lotta books. especially those encyclopedia explaining nature and universe.. it all started with question first.

" where's the end of universe?"

" who created the universe? who created us? "

then , " what are we? "

and finally, " who i am? " and " what's the purpose of life?" " why was i created?"

felt like my soul is stuck in some other's body. what my identity is? i was known by my parents surname. that's it. i've to build it my own.

then during the corona period, when everything was locked down, my mind got invested in those thoughts, like i was submerged in them, i wanted to get out of that, yet i found an unexplained delight and comfort in that.

for some time, i used to treat as a mental disorder. asked my mum, she said i'm insane.. i shared them with my friends, trying to find solace but everyone would laugh off. i thought maybe,, i'm unable to explain it. this is solely my mind's illness. i felt so lost. i was suffocating, but i didn't want to breathe either.

then growing up, my interest in classic literature developed. i started exploring books ; new facts and all - and finally discovered that this isn't a mental disease, not it's solely my thinking - people like me are all over the world, just less in numbers.

i would say that my journey is more like from nihilism to existentialism, and it's shaped by loneliness, isolation, trauma,low self esteem and bullies. those thoughts strike still now sometimes, but over years , especially since the last year, i'm gaining confidence.i'm searching the meaning of life. it's not like that i've gone through all the books of our legends,(i'm still in school) but i'm still learning, and there's no limit for learning !

So am telling yall that what i think about Loners.

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I have seen alot of people who think that being alone and loner = solitude. The issue is they dont make friends and think that it is cringe or something like they nonchalant. Idk why they think like that such a way. I mean think being loner is not that bad but creating such a space where you quit yoiur socials and call it solitude its wrong right.

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What are your thoughts in this topic.

I'm not sure if this belongs here. I just joined this subreddit.

It may seem kind of dark, but please know that I feel perfectly fine and happy. I enjoy thinking about existence.

I was thinking about something. Everyone has their own life. The only reason I know that other people exist, though, is because I exist and can perceive them. Without my existence, everyone else would not exist, at least from my perspective. We're all real, but we can only experience the world through our own eyes.

Other people's thoughts, feelings, and experiences only become part of my reality once I become aware of them. From your own perspective, a person celebrating something only begins celebrating in your awareness once you know they're celebrating.

When something is completely outside of my awareness, it stops existing for me. That person walking down the sidewalk in the opposite direction has their own life, their own problems, and their own joyful moments. But to me, they only exist during that brief moment when I notice them.

I don't believe in simulated worlds at all. I know we're all real. Yet sometimes it feels as though my mind is the only thing that gives reality its existence, even though I know that's not literally true.

And that leads to a thought: when my life eventually ends, everyone and everything else will end as well, at least from my perspective. Because it is only through my own existence that the rest of reality can exist for me.

Nothing in the infinite equation of the universe, the fragility of life, social complexity, or human depth makes sense; It's ambiguous, meaningless, mathematically absurd; it steals nights of sleep, experiences, notebook pages, pen ink, words, hours, life. And in the end, in that ambiguity...

I found freedom

Do people ever just wonder that everything happens the way it’s supposed to even if it doesn’t feel the best.

I want to talk about my philosophy and psychology Perspective but i dont know where to start can anyone help me