If we want to create life, we procreate.
If we want to take life, we kill.
It fascinates me how, without thinking or active processing, we can create such complex life forms that are able to function just like us.
Humans are already so complex, comparatively.
We can laugh, we can think and contemplate, et cetera. We dominate the world and force the other species to bend to our will, yet we are also the only species that has individuals willing to end their own lives (suicide).
A couple days ago, I started playing a game called Battlefield 1. The game depicts the stories of different fighters on different fronts in World War 1, and does a great job of showing just how gruesome the war was. Throughout the entirety of the campaign, one of the main things you are able to capture is just how much death there was throughout the war for both sides.
I beat the campaign and took a break from the game before trying the multiplayer. I soon started thinking about death, and how we die.
My father passed away just over a year ago now, out of the blue from a heart attack, and since then, life has not been the same for me. Things have gotten a lot more serious. I witnessed firsthand just how easy it is to die, and to lose everything you have worked for your entire life. It never really struck me until I started thinking about it yesterday after playing Battlefield. I am now absolutely terrified of dying.
This may be controversial, but I would rather be open. I do not believe in anything. I am not sure if there is a higher power, or an afterlife, because I am unable to see anything. There is no proof for me that anything exists, and thus I withhold my belief. I personally refuse to believe in stories and books written and constructed by humans, as I believe there is a lot of potential for error, bias, and deceit. Furthermore, there are multiple religions throughout the world. Despite some similar beliefs, they are ultimately different. Somebody has to be wrong, I think.
Anyway, I personally do not believe in anything. However, I am totally okay with, and supportive of others believing in what they think is right. Due to my lack of belief, I am petrified of what will happen when I die. Perhaps others believe in something because they are sure there is something post-death, but I am not sure. How can I be certain when I have no proof? I do not like to go into things blind and uncertain (namely religion, in this example), but it also scares me because I will be living a blind. I will be living with uncertainty. I could die at any moment. With the advancement of technology, it becomes easier and easier to take life.
I have lived for a couple of decades now, and I imagine what life will be like for me when fifty or sixty years progress. I will be on the verge of death, if not dead already. What then? What am I supposed to think about each and every day, when I know it is only a matter of time before I am gone? I am absolutely terrified of that ever happening, yet I know it will. I am scared. I have talked to people about this, and I have done some research to see if anybody else felt this way. Others have, indeed. Many of the responses they got, and some of the responses I received ultimately said: "Make your mark on this world, so you will be remembered when you are gone."
For me, it is not about remembrance. I try to be modest and humble in my approach and demeanor. I do not really want people to remember me as if I am some hero. I do not want to 'be remembered.' I want to be alive. I do not want to die. If you have gotten this far, I am genuinely curious to know what has been going through your mind as you read this post. I would like to know what you think about my comments and sentiments, and I would like to know about your own thoughts on the matter.
Based on my recent thoughts about death, I have started to think more about life, too. I saw many people say that we have to make the most out of life, and it always made sense, but never clicked until now. We really do have to make the most out of our lives. Not just life as a whole, but each year, each day, each second. I do not believe that means we always have to assess the value of our time (i.e. was I more productive today or yesterday?). Rather, I think making the most out of something means we should be enjoying ourselves. We always need to be doing what we love, pursuing our passions, et cetera. These things have always been thrown around and I have heard them a lot, but I have never thought about them in the context of life or death.
I have always been interested in things throughout my life. I always thought things were 'cool,' although I never pursued anything. In elementary school when we were brought to the career fair, I said I wanted to be a pyrotechnic because to me, fire was cool, and manipulating fire was cooler. However, I never looked at the job outlook, the potential rigor associated with the field, et cetera.
Later on, I started thinking chemistry was 'cool' when I was in high school. I never had any sort of passion for it. I just thought it was somewhat interesting, and started developing a short-term interest in Materials Science. I thought the ability to manipulate existing materials and to create new ones was amazing. That was the time when the 'supermaterial,' graphene, was being highly touted. Nanotechnology was fascinating. Materials that are lighter than a dandelion but over a thousand times stronger. Amazing.
Despite that interest, I ended up going to college for Mechanical Engineering. I had even started getting into wearing watches, and bought a stainless steel, gold-plated watch along with a ceramic watch, and also wanted to buy a polyurethane watch. Nonetheless, this interest in materials and Chemistry went nowhere. I switched to Mechanical Engineering, and Physics, for no reason other than the fact that it sounded 'cool.' I did not even know what a Mechanical Engineer was. I... still don't, and I am now a senior in college.
Initially, I thought Mechanical Engineering was 'cool' because you got to 'make stuff.' In other words, I had no idea what I was doing. During my first semester, I realized it was not for me. I thought it was way too theoretical with all the calculus we were doing. It did not seem practical or hands on. I thus switched to a dual-major in Marketing and Business Analytics because it seemed more practical, and again, I had no idea what I was doing. A dual-major sounded cool, though. More safe, too, compared to physics. Less of a chance to not find a job.
I switched majors midway through my Freshman year, and I am now in the middle of my first semester as a Senior, which is almost three years later. Marketing and Analytics are... cool, but I feel lost. I am not passionate about these things at all. I have tried doing independent research with one of my professors. I went to him outside of class and asked if I could do research as I wanted to learn, learn, learn. I ultimately wanted to see if I could become passionate about my major and academic field. That has not happened.
In less than a year, I will graduate (hopefully), and I will have two degrees (hopefully). What do those mean, though, if I am not passionate about what I worked for throughout four years, had no idea what the hell I was doing during that time?
I have a lot of random interests:
- Beatboxing
- Calligraphy
- Drones/quadcopters
- Photography/filmography
- Random bits of technology such as the Surface Book (laptop), the ACM (credit card wallet), the Mavic Pro (portable quadcopter), Google Andromeda (a rumored operating system), et cetera.
- Perfumery/fragrances
- Capoeira (a martial art)
- Learning foreign languages (currently focusing on Spanish)
All of the things listed above are 'cool,' but I am not really passionate enough about any of them to seem to pursue them as a career, or passion.
I have all these random little interests despite living my entire life caged up. I had been taught, as I grew up, that the home was 'safe,' and venturing outside of the home was ultimately unnecessary. If I wanted to go to a friend's house, my father would often tell me I might be bothering their parents by going over.
"Why would you want to go into the wilderness and cause trouble?," he said.
They were fine with me going to somebody's house occasionally. They were not strict. They had their own traditional views but did not force them on me heavily. Nonetheless, I kept to myself throughout life. I had gotten into video games early on in my life, and I have been hooked ever since. Video games were a sort of escape from reality. It is not that anything bad was going on in my life. Rather, nothing was going on. My parents were always working. My brother and sister were at least ten years older than me, so they did their own thing throughout the day. Ultimately, I was alone. I played video games because it was the only thing I thought I could do.
Cartoons. Video games. Cartoons. Sleep.
School. Video games. Homework. Video games. Sleep.
School. Video games. Sleep.
School. Sleep. Homework. Video games. Sleep.
School. Homework. Video games. Sleep.
School. A trip to the grocery store. Video games. Sleep.
Cartoons. Video games. Cartoons. Video games. Sleep.
That is a rough depiction of what a typical week was like for me. This was not an outlier, but the norm. I did not really interact with people too much other than my immediate family and some 'acquaintances' in school. I never really had good friends. Only acquaintances that I would talk to in school, and forget about when I got home and started playing video games.
I could go on and on. I have already written a lot and detailed most of life. To finalize this piece, I would like to tell you why I just told you about my childhood. I want to tell you why I told you about my present situation before I told you about my childhood, and before I told you about what I see as the future.
I have been lonely, as you have been able to deduce.
I have been lazy throughout my life, too. Everything was always handed to me, and I never had to really work for anything. Things were too easy. I never had to take risks. I was never encouraged to go out and get 'rough in the mud.' I was never encouraged to be passionate about something. If I was ever encouraged to do something, it was to do what somebody else thought would be good for me. Things had been too stable. I think that is why I have been clueless about school and college. I never had to think about what I wanted to do later on in life. I do not blame anybody for this. It is not as if I was raised poorly, I think.
I had never thought about any of this until a few months ago when school was starting again. I ultimately realized it was about to be 'crunch time.' Time for things to get a lot more serious. Time for me to become more independent. Almost time to find a job, despite having found no internships (mostly due to not being motivated enough to search for any).
As I thought about all this, I thought to myself: "Even if I get a job, what would life be like? I would still be here in the same house, around the same people, et cetera. I would still be somewhat tethered."
The thoughts then started to augment themselves and get stronger. I started thinking about what it would be like now, had I taken risks before. Had life been harder. Had things been unstable for me throughout life. Had I explored things throughout the world. Little-by-little, my thoughts were growing and growing. All these little parts coming together to form a whole.
I am now seriously considering joining the military after I get out of school. Why? I believe it will allow me to explore, to take risks, to live in an unstable, ever-changing environment. Furthermore, I will be able to become disciplined. I will be able to start from 'scratch,' essentially. I will be in an environment where I am totally unfamiliar with the surroundings and I have nobody to fall back to. I feel I need something like this, to be able to truly experience the world and life in general.
My mother is absolutely against it. I have even had reservations due to my father having passed away. She would be alone despite my siblings living awfully close.
I have gone back-and-forth, and it has recently come to a lull, where I have not thought about it much. However, it has picked up due to my recent thoughts about death. I feel I do need to make the most out of life. I do not want to join the military to kill, but rather to create life. I want to create the life I never had.
That is all. Let me know what you think about my thoughts. Thank you for reading. Enjoy the rest of your day/night.