not sure this is a social problem

[mickey]

Sometimes I get into a mood where it feels like life is just a hamster wheel. I don't mean only my life but the life of everyone who ever lived and ever will or could live. I mean life itself. Everything has already been done and said countless times in the 200,000 years our subspecies has existed, countless people have had the same experiences we're now having, so it's like we're all running as hard as we can and the wheel is spinning like crazy but we stay in the same place.

One corollary is that wanting to improve the world is a waste of time. We can change political and economic systems and social norms, but human nature never changes, so every superficial change we ever make ends up falling apart and things end up being fundamentally the same. I am a bit amazed about how the young people of every generation want to change the world and don't realize their parents did too at that age, and so did their parents' parents, and so on. And it seems like such a waste for every new generation to go through exactly the same crap.

This isn't any kind of crisis, just a mood I get into sometimes. Pills wouldn't help me with it, and it passes anyway, because I put universal futility out of my mind and go on with things. And keep that wheel spinning just so it can spin, just because.

Thank you for reading.

 

[jason2023]

I get what you mean in the high level scheme of things, a macro level. But you have to look at it at a micro level, your own unique circumstance. How I see it may not be the same as how you may see it...

I think first of all, it's a privilege we're able to experience life as human beings. We really do take things for granted, even the simplest of things such as a functioning bodies and life we have. It is only when we experience losing it that we realise how important these things are (i.e. if you had an eye infection and your vision starts blurring it is then you realise how important your sight is, or if you're walking through a city think how amazing how advanced we have become - could you build that train infrastructure you see before you?).

That's the basic of it, appreciating everything. You do what you feel fufils and grows you, is of value to you. It doesn't matter what other generations have done, or the traditions, even if it's been done before. In fact, I think the world is evolving constantly - if you went a few generations back I'm sure they'd love to experience what we have and again, what we take for granted each day.

 

[Tealeaf]

I don't buy that change isn't possible so much that some forces are themselves a force of nature, whether it's greed or a hurricane. Human beings have gone from believing the sun revolves around the Earth to limited space travel in less than the span of a few thousand years, which is the blink of an eye as far as nature goes. We've simply outpaced our ability to change along with our discoveries.

Which is why I don't buy that people are stupid when all evidence points to people simply being selfish, gluttonous, deceptive, and cruel. At some point, however, we had to develop into social animals to begin with. Whether or not poverty is eliminated in our lifetime is of less importance than whether or not our efforts enable someone to live a life they wouldn't have been able to otherwise.

 

[exasperated]

Sound like logical existential thinking to me rather than a mood. Sometimes it's hard to be someone that sees the big picture. I guess life really is just a series of distractions.

Sometimes I get into a mood where it feels like life is just a hamster wheel. I don't mean only my life but the life of everyone who ever lived and ever will or could live. I mean life itself. Everything has already been done and said countless times in the 200,000 years our subspecies has existed, countless people have had the same experiences we're now having, so it's like we're all running as hard as we can and the wheel is spinning like crazy but we stay in the same place.

One corollary is that wanting to improve the world is a waste of time. We can change political and economic systems and social norms, but human nature never changes, so every superficial change we ever make ends up falling apart and things end up being fundamentally the same. I am a bit amazed about how the young people of every generation want to change the world and don't realize their parents did too at that age, and so did their parents' parents, and so on. And it seems like such a waste for every new generation to go through exactly the same crap.

This isn't any kind of crisis, just a mood I get into sometimes. Pills wouldn't help me with it, and it passes anyway, because I put universal futility out of my mind and go on with things. And keep that wheel spinning just so it can spin, just because.

Thank you for reading.