Existentialism is a philosophical school of thought that deals with human existence, trying to explain the purpose of a human life. Existentialism, like many other schools of thought, is of course only a speculation and something we made up, take what you read here with a pinch of salt (after all, I don’t know any more about life than you do!)

If I were to try to explain existentialism easily, I’m afraid I’ll lose out on its intricacies, but I’ll give it a shot anyway. Existentialism, at its most fundamental level, says that every person is responsible for defining their own purpose in this world and that we are governed by our free will. Existentialism says that we are not here to ‘find purpose’, but rather to ‘create our reality and purpose’.

It sounds simple, but that’s because I’ve tried to break down roughly a few centuries worth of study and philosophical evolution into four sentences.

Existentialism originated as a school of thought in the 19th-20th Century, and one of its pioneers was Friedrich Nietzsche, a German philosopher (1844-1900). Nietschze among other things was a famed critic of the Church and religion, which ties in with the fact that he was a founding father of existentialism because while religion says that our actions and decisions are up to the behest of God, existentialism says that we get to make our decisions. You may have never heard of him, but I’m sure you’ve heard of his renowned quote, “That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”.

He wanted his work to teach us ‘how to become who we really are’. You can learn more about Nietschze in this video.

For the sake of constraining this blog to existentialism only, I’ve not talked about other existentialists, but you can check out the sources below to get an entire archive of study about its important figures.

Existentialism’s main ideas

A key idea of existentialism is that ‘we are alone’. Since existentialism talks about each person finding their own purpose, it makes sense that we are ‘on our own’ for the most part. This idea, though, causes a lot of anxiety and anguish. Even though there are 7 billion people on this planet, according to existentialism we are profoundly alone because every person is living based on their own choices and the responsibilities that come with those choices. This makes people feel depressed, and this is why many people brand existentialism as some kind of ‘depressing, loneliness inducing and meaningless concept’.

“You feel anxiety because you recognize that you and you alone are responsible for your actions. This produces the two-sided feeling of simultaneous dread and exhilaration.” – Source 2

Absurdity

Existence precedes essence

Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980), a French philosopher and another founding father of existentialism coined this phrase, and to present it simply, “existence precedes essence” refers to the fact that when you’re born, you have no meaning, no purpose, no definition. Human beings exist first, and only later define themselves.

For me, an easy way to relate to existentialism is through astronomy. In a universe crowded with billions upon billions of stars, planets and other objects, we stand alone on this blue rock. If we are the only ones here, we truly are, influencing the universe on our own.

7 billion people experienced this same day in a different way.

Let’s put this in perspective. Break things down.

1 billion seconds is roughly 31.7 years.
Therefore, 7 billion seconds is Roughly 221.9 years.
Every second, 222 experienced years have passed.
Every minute, 13,314 experienced years have passed.
Every hour, 798,840 experienced years have passed.
Every day, 19,172,160 experienced years have passed.
Over 19 MILLION YEARS pass in a day.
Let that sink in. – /u/PsychoNerd91

There’s more to do than can ever be done.