Important. Period.

What did I learn in college?  Lots of stuff... most of it's forgotton, which actually is some kind of justice, since my degree doesn't seem to be helping me personally or professionally.  There was one thing though, that stuck and stuck like glue.  It is absolutely the single most important thing I learned in college and having this awareness alone makes the ridiculous tuition at a major public university worth it.  So, just read this, save your money, and move on.

I was a philosophy major in college for a few semesters and it caused more problems for me than it did me good... it's just constant cycling, it's an intellectual 3 ring circus, with no elephants.  One of the things I gravitated toward was "meaning" like, purpose, you know?  Like what is the meaning of all of this, all of this effort, what is it for?  I don't remember who it was I was reading but I remember the message.  It's something like this, obviously this isn't verbatim.  

Human beings have an incurable tendency to want to be important, not conditionally important... but important PERIOD.  That raises a whole host of problems, because ultimately, no one ever really achieves that.  It's an impossibility... even the Sun isn't important period.  It's important to everyone on Earth and it's important to our solar system... but it's not important in the context of the Milky Way, there are billions of stars in this galaxy and more than billions of galaxies in the Universe.  If I'm looking to be important period... well... I'm always going to be frustrated and unhappy.  So... why not just tie large weighted objects to my feet and throw myself off a bridge, would it really matter?  If life is painful and the storm really shows no signs of letting up, what the fuck am I doing this for?   Well, I may not be important period, but I am important conditionally, and so are you.  If I can find meaning in my life in my mother or my father or my relationships or my dogs or a cause or writing or making people's day or whatever... then all of those things are important and all of those things make me important.  Yeah, so, you might say, "Well, if you love someone and they love you but ultimately you're both meaningless then the meaning you find in each other doesn't matter and you're both just a wash of meaningless misery."  I would say in return, "I have some weights and rope in my basement... there's a bridge right down the street."

If the meaning I find in my life means nothing to you... I'm fine with that.  Ultimately, whatever meaning I find is enough for me, so long as I choose to look for it and as long as I have no expectations of being important period.

Period.

tg