Existentialism is a luxury!

It was a usual Thursday evening just like countless other evenings when I came back after an exhausting day at work and sat down to have my dinner with some light dose of Netflix. I was watching a light-hearted series when one of the side character asks one of the main character — “Why am I doing this? Why am I away from my parents, drunk in a place full of strangers after an exhausting day selling electric bulbs? Is all this really worth it?”

And boy, did that tsunami of existentialism hit me or what. I kept on watching the episode but you can very well guess that I had not been able to move on from that one scene. Fast forward to yesterday when I’m talking to a friend who has taken a leave from office for “self-loathing”. I knew this was getting serious and I had to find a way out or I was going to dive deep down that pool of pointless overthinking again.

But then by some divine intervention, some neurons in my brain decided to end the standoff and fired themselves and I had a bright idea. Who better to answer my existential problems than the ones who are the cause of my existence? So I woke up (on time) this Saturday morning and called up my dad and fired all my questions at him.

What is the purpose of my existence?

Why am I doing what I’m doing, not just spiritually but materialistically as well?

I have a job (that I like), but that does not seem to be the end goal. Since this is not what I really want to do, then why am I away from my parents, earning money to spend it on things that I don’t need but I buy only to make my (hollow) life here more bearable.

The first statement was the most obvious one, but one that I had not expected —

Urggghh.

But things went smooth after that. My dad said it’s a spiritual problem and if I really wanted a solution to those question, I should seek a Guru and embrace Sufism, but after repeatedly rephrasing my queries we reached a common understanding and then I had my answer. I’ll rephrase that for you.

I asked my dad how he battled existential thoughts like these and he said he never had them.

“We have spent all our lives battling crisis, one after another, that we never got time to think about it. We never had this luxury.”

I might be generalizing a bit here, but we really have grown up in a world full of entitlement. We went to a school and felt entitled to not being beaten by a teacher and treated with respect no matter what. We went to a college feeling entitled to a job by the end of it. Most of the people a generation before us had to look for job, fight for them but our generation got it easy. We gave tests and interviews in air conditioned rooms and came out with offer letters.

We don’t value what we have. We are constantly looking at others, better jobs, better work environment, better homes, better vacations. We buy things and we drink to make ourselves feel better and then we feel bad that we had to resort to this to forget our failures.

The previous generations look up to us and they see success. They see that at an age when they were cluelessly wandering the streets looking for job we have resumes filled with projects and internships.

They see that we got a job so easily that they had to fight for and yet we are not satisfied. They see our entitlement and they see our hunger for more. Sometimes they scoff at it, sometimes they are amazed.

They see entrepreneur and they see athletes at ages when they did not even know about most of it. Our generation is an inspiration to many. Talk to anyone of significance or check out your workplace website. They all want to know what the millennials are thinking and how we can guide them. They’re expecting us to lead them to future, this is crazy.

Yes we are. We got a better world than the people before us. I’m not saying it’s any less difficult, but it’s better. Even if we get jobs before graduating from college, it isn’t a handout, we too fight for it.

So when we bicker and we complain that our lives are pointless and empty, we fail ourselves. If you feel you’re meant for more than this, then don’t stop, work for it.

You hate your job — resign and look for a better job. You’ll find one if you deserve better.

You miss your parents — go live with them, but without any expectation of support from them.

Yes, we are to blame, but let’s cut ourselves some slack as well. We are a generation in transition. We are experiencing a lot of things that generations before us did not experience. These new experiences began with us, we can guide our siblings and our children in future, but there is no help available for us.

Similarly, we can’t help but shake off the past entirely. There are things that generations after us will not experience and these experiences, that our previous generations had, will end with us.

We have to carry the water in the palm of our hands, and ensure that we don’t spill any of it. We have to balance both the worlds. The landline and the 5G!

There is no war going on in the world that we can be a part of like our predecessors, but a war is brewing up and it’s the war that all the future generations will now have to fight. It’s the war within us. As social realities change, new struggles and miseries are coming up and we are the ones at the forefront. We will have to set the rules and devise the strategies. This is what we will be remembered for. This is the purpose of our existence.

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