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Can someone remind me what is the point?

Calbue
Community Member

Hi,

I'm new to this forum so if I'm missing some etiquette... I apologise in advance.

I guess, the reason why I started this thread was to ask... what is the point? Is there a point? I know that to live means to be happy, to be at peace, to be ok and to be with family and friends. I get that. I truly do. But for now, why does it feel like things are pointless? For context, I'm still at uni doing my course, but it feels like there is no point to getting my degree when the future is so uncertain. When will things be ok? Will I always be down like this? I don't know if its the lockdown that's making me feel this way or if its just something that's been brewing inside me for years. Most likely, the latter... now that I think about it. Everything, for years, has felt like such an effort. Like I'm constantly exhausted by doing the bare minimum.

I know we have to truly process our thoughts to recover, but when I try it gets too much sometimes and makes it worse. My anxiety shoots through the roof, and it feels like my heart beats as fast as a hummingbird flaps its wings. Is there any other perspective that will help?

I hope someone is kind enough to reply...

15 Replies 15

Succulent Queen
Community Member

I just want to validate what youre thinking as being a perfectly normal and common experience. I have thought the thoughts youre having.

I hope I havent missed your point by saying the following (and sorry if I have). If you can focus on uni and work to reduce overthinking by using gratefulness, meditation etc this will help you in the years to come. An education can save your life, even if its just by being able to pay for support or any therapeutic activity whatsoever. Education and money can better your experience of mental health (if that's what's going on for you). The point of many things can take years to become clear. You dont have to know the point yet, just know there is one.

NotYetEffulgent
Community Member

Hi Calbue,

Thanks for posting. I’ve been asking myself the same question recently. It’s also a big question we ask of ourselves and one that many minds have pondered throughout the ages.

I’ve been feeling as though every few years I end up back at square one. Like an infinite snakes and ladders game. If I consider my impact so far, I doubt I’ve added much benefit to society or to those I love. I feel as though I work solely for the privilege of staying alive to work again tomorrow, to constantly doubt and question every thing and to feel guilty for the burden my poverty places on others. Everything for me right now is “should” “must” “need to”, it is a very lonely, exhausting and unfulfilling mindset.

The future is usually uncertain. I question if the pandemic has really made it more uncertain? I’d ague it has changed obstacles and has brought into focus the underlying risks that were always present. No one in history has ever truly conquered risk or uncertainty. We can actually end up feeding our doubts in trying to convince ourselves that we can forecast everything. Seeking perfection before starting is a doom to never start, continuing to perfect once started is a doom to never enjoy.

I believe the universe holds no inherent meaning and that evolution didn’t intend for us to be content. I think the great highs in our lives are diminished without the great lows. I also think the human condition allows for us to write our own meaning and wow are there so many positive and different ways to go about that. Advance the species, alleviate hardship, protect the rights of fellow humans, protect the environment that provides; pursue a legacy or raise a child; notch up a record or live for adventure; discover, understand or research something new; heal someone or change minds or laws; build something, write something, teach something, lead something. Yes there is also love, intimacy, family and friendship. Right now though, I find the most fulfilment in the teaching I do and yet still i feel like an exhausted failure. Is it solely our perspective then? Our mindset?

While recent science may say we have no free will, we do have the illusion of it and that’s powerful. I love Gandalf’s quote from LOTR, but what a burden it can be: "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”

Hi Succulent Queen,

I wanted to say that I think you’re right about overthinking it. At some point you have to pick a path and walk down it. Rarely do we have all the information at hand to make a completely informed decision and you never truly know where you’ll end up. I don’t know that all education is equal though, nor filled with riches at the end.

I reckon money is a tool, it can buy you great happiness and great sadness. Miss use a tool and it’ll bite you bad. Gotta have the right tool for job; the right amount of money for the life you lead and seek to lead. Everyone has different levels of motivation, stamina and energy. Not to mention luck. Plenty of people work hard and earn very little, plenty of people work hard and earn a lot, others started out with money, others still walked into money.

Enjoying at least part of the choice process and the journey is important. I totally reckon that gratefulness, meditation and mindfulness can help us to do that.

geoff
Champion Alumni
Champion Alumni

Hello Calbue, I understand everything you have said and thanks to those who have replied back to you.

These lockdowns have changed how we think, before all of this happened we had an agenda, something we wanted to aim for, a direction but because of having to endure this, then releasing us or easing the lockdown, then back into closed doors, we basically don't know what direction we're heading for, it confuses us.

Many times we begin to wonder whether what we're doing is what we want to do, so there's this question mark that hovers over our head and when we begin to lose interest, that's the time we need to rethink the future.

Do you want to persevere struggling to complete the course because at the moment you have no intention of finishing the assignments or when able to, go to the lectures but prefer staying at home, that's a reason to defer your course, simply because you're not interested completing it at the moment.

Your health and well being is paramount, you don't want to push through something that you don't want to do, all this will do is make you feel worse, that's not what we want to happen and I know that appointments may be by phone, but it doesn't stop you from contacting your doctor, because as soon as everything becomes an effort and have no interest in life, could mean you could be suffering from any type of mental illness.

We'd like to hear a bit more about your life, but only if you want to.

Take care.

Geoff.

therising
Valued Contributor
Valued Contributor

Hi Calbue

I believe we can easily lose sight of the philosopher in us who wonders and questions 'Why am I here? What is my purpose, how do I fit into the grand scheme of things?' Pair one philosopher with another and it becomes an enlightening conversation, with potentially great revelation. Pair a philosopher with someone who doesn't care to question or wonder and it may sound a little like (from them) 'Why do you ask such ridiculous questions? Why don't you just get on with things and stop overthinking everything'. Personally, I'd much rather be paired with an open minded philosopher.

Can remember coming out of a decade and a half in depression some years ago with the thought 'I don't know who I am. I need to re-member myself, put myself back together'. Do you recall your very young self as an excitement seeker, an adventurer or somewhat of a risk taker? Do you recall this self as being the questioner of just about everything (Why is the sky blue? Why can't I have this or that.? Why do I have to see Grandma when she's just a mean angry old lady?). Do you recall yourself often seeking reasons, in your quest to be more reasonable? Do you recall fiercely standing up for yourself, as the warrior/the challenger, refusing to back down (aka having a tantrum)? Do you recall what it was like not to judge before you were led to judge or measure everything (your height, your weight, your overall appearance, the race, age or religion of someone else, your social status etc)? The question becomes 'What does it take to remember this self?' By the way, if Grandma was a mean old angry lady, our parents should have stopped enabling her behaviour. That's just not fair on a kid.

Lock down definitely feels like we've been grounded for way too long, by a parent who just won't fully listen to how incredibly depressing it can be. While being grounded or brought back down to earth can be healthy at times (as it leads us to manage in taking responsibility), at other times it just feels like someone's clipped your wings and you can feel it at such a deep level. Living in Melbourne has been incredibly challenging.

I believe it's in our nature to feel our self in a challenge, to sense the presence of a challenge. Those who are sensitive will feel it more. It's the philosopher in us who wonders and questions those feelings, in order to make sense of everything. To feel is perhaps our most common sense. We felt so much as kids; we were so tuned into feeling our way through life.

🙂

quirkywords
Community Champion
Community Champion

Calbue

Thanks so much for starting this thread and sharing your thoughts honestly.

Several people have given interesting perspectives and suggestions.

Iam someone who always asks questions and I think sometimes I have two philosophers engaging in questioning and others one philosopher and one who does not see the point.

My house and business were destroyed in black summer fires and I coped for a while being busy trying to find a place to live and organising myself ! Then about a year later I started asking questions Why me ? What was the point? People said you always learn a life lesson from a disaster but I kept questioning.

I suppose I found my questions were not helping me and so I looked at things thst did help me. I was volunteering in different places and that gave me a sense of purpose. I was volunteering before but now it gave me a routine.

I think people who think and are questions are trying to work things out so they make sense.

By writing your post you have helped me and many other who read your post but do not answer.
Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts with us and if you want you can share more.

we are listening and you are not alone.

Calbue
Community Member
Hi Geoff,

These lockdowns have definitely changed the way we think. I think it changed the way I think as well. I had a plan, that I thought was for sure my future, but now? Not so much. I think that in itself was enough to knock me off my feet for a long time. Still does. Its sort of like waves just hitting me and my head is barely above water. You hit the mark on so many things… this lockdown has made me reconsider a lot of things and I think that scares me. I’m losing interest in my course, and that scares me a lot given that I am literally 2 subjects away from finishing. I don’t want this to be another thing I failed at. After 6 years, and battling a load of mental health issues when trying to finish my course… to give up now would mean I suffered for nothing.

I truly know that my health and wellbeing is paramount, but sometimes it just sucks when you’ve suffered so much for so little in return. I just want to succeed at something. To finally finish something. Do you ever feel that way?

I think also, now that I’m sure that my course is not in the industry I want to go in, I’m lost now more than ever. I hate feeling this way.

Lockdown has also made me realise that I have no idea who I am outside of work and my uni education. I feel like I have all this free time to stress about who I am and what my hobbies are when I feel like I literally have none? I’ve been trying to figure it out for a year now, and still.. no luck. I guess that’s another reason why I still feel lost more than ever.

Thank you for your response Geoff. I really appreciate your input.

Hi Quirkywords,

Thank you for reminding me I’m not alone. It sometimes feel that way.

People definitely do say that we’re given challenges in this world to learn and grow. But it is really hard to overcome and persevere when things get really tough. It keeps you thinking, wondering, questioning… why does the universe keep putting these challenges in our way? Why can’t life just be simple? Easy?

Losing your home and your business? That is truly devastating. I don’t think I could have handled that. Not on my own.

I’m glad volunteering gave you a sense of purpose. I’ve been trying to find purpose by simply doing, but its been hard when things feel a bit… pointless right now? Like what is the point of trying and doing things when its not something that’s even… going to be useful? I don’t know. I don’t really know how to put it into words.

Routines… I’ve been trying to keep my routine during lockdown, but life just feels so bleak and dull. Showering, getting dressed, being presentable… for who? For myself? I try to tell myself everyday that doing things for myself is just as valid as getting ready/presentable for others. For example, when going to work or university. So why do I keep feeling this way? Why do I keep feeling that doing things for myself isn’t worth it? It’s frustrating because I know that I am and will always be one of the most important people in my life. So why do I feel this way?

geoff
Champion Alumni
Champion Alumni

Hello Calbue, thanks for getting back to us.

All of this must feel crossing the road and hoping for the best, not sure what may happen, that's what this lockdown has put all of us in not knowing what can possibly happen now.

Are you able to do one subject part time or is this only going to draw out being able to finish much longer, but it's a thought.

During lockdown all the things we used to love to do have gone amiss, we've lost interest, not because we aren't able to or have the interest but simply because we don't have the energy or desire, maybe we need to buy something, but we can't, the shops have been shut so it doesn't appeal to us anymore and watching movies does get boring, people say 'why haven't you had a shower at 4 pm or why haven't you got dressed out of your pyjamas, day after day, that's pressure we don't want.

Is there any activity that you had thought about doing, but a bit frightened or not had the time, now might be the time to start, something to occupy your time, something that might stimulate or encourage you to do, that you've been putting off.

I'd love to hear from you.

Best wishes.

Geoff.