A little existentialism

i’m wrestling with my faith, these days. holding her down by the wrists while she tries to escape from me. or maybe it is her who is begging me to stay while i’m kicking and pushing her out. to be honest, i don’t want to lose her, but she’s constantly being put into question lately, and i feel like we are both about to give in.

i’m talking about people.
i’ve been thinking a lot about purpose. rather, the lack of it. when i talk to my friends, they tell me the most confusing stories about certain interactions that they have. i have a handful of these mind-wrecking experiences, too. these stories have scripts that consist of bunches of paragraphs mixed and shaken up together, then poured over a piece of paper, without any plotline or apparent rational train of thought. just one senseless plot twist after another. stories in which you never fully see the characters, you never fully grasp their intentions, you are never sure where they are or where they will go next. like electrons around the atomic nucleus, their location within the decor seems a matter of probability, never a certainty, and there you are, making calculations to try and figure them out. stories in which you are never sure if the end has come yet, if you are way past it, or if there will ever be one. stories with second, third or god knows how many parts. stories, all of them with different suspects, under a spectrum of lights, and in varying scenarios, but all of them really the same.

what i struggle with the most is the lack of coherence. i have identified in all of them a common denominator, which is the key that keeps me from understanding anything at all: the absence of commitment. commitment not as in let’s get married, commitment as in i’m a person, you are a person, so there is this implicit agreement established between us by which we will try not to hurt each other. from what i’ve gathered, there is no agreement whatsoever, friends. or, in other words, there is a lot of free will with a lot lot of individualism on top.

are people becoming ever so selfish and unattached from one another that they genuinely do not care about the impact of their actions? or is their behavior just a reflection of their general lack of purpose? if there is no purpose in interactions, they mean nothing, and so whatever you do about them does not matter either. relating to a stranger in any way becomes equivalent to filling the fuel tank of your car — something you will need to do from time to time to move forward in life, but into which you don’t really invest any care or interest. i’d like to say i’m exaggerating but what will never cease to amaze me is that i’m actually not. this predisposition is the norm in the stories i’ve been told, in my own stories. being honest while caring and careful is more like an anomaly — a fact outside the verified theory that still happens from time to time, and that we seem not to be able to explain yet. isn’t it crazy that it should be the other way around?

a certain amount of selfishness, to call it in some way, is for all of us necessary. ideally, everyone should make their decisions taking into account what’s best for them. but there is a big gap between acting in alignment with your wants and needs, and performing constant acts of oblivion in order to get there. you could actually be kind when, let’s say, disappearing from someone’s life or wanting something different for yourself. instead, i constantly find the following: people will flirt with you for weeks and suddenly, one good day, become a complete different person and leave you feeling all confused, revisiting conversations, actions, looks, gestures, until you can’t but conclude that you made everything up in your head; people will text you for days in a row showing genuine interest in your likes and dreams and drama and one day just never reply back; people will have the audacity to ask for your number out of nowhere but then never call you; people will say i love you to each other for years and then become complete strangers for the rest of their lives.

granted, you can just change your mind along the course of an interaction/relationship but it is the way in which you proceed that just keeps me wondering what does it all mean?
why would you enter in someone’s world when they are purposefully letting you in to then just suddenly disappear without any explanation and leave a hole? why would you give someone a piece of your time to then fully erradicate them from your life two weeks later? why would you show interest one second and then seem like you lost it completely the next? how can you love someone with all your heart and then, one day, feel like you don’t even know who they are anymore, like you don’t even like them anymore?
what does it mean that people can do these things? i’m not giving you breaking news if i state that society has abandoned a sense of community and it is, day by day, becoming more individualistic. people do not care anymore about hurting each other, you’ll just get over it. and of course you’ll get over it, but can’t we just be mindful about others? i don’t think i’m asking for anything unfeasible, though it does seem unrealistic considering the evidence, just a little softness and kindness with those around us, especially when those around us are giving us a piece of themselves. acting like you care about someone and then withdrawing altogether from their life is not okay. can’t we all see how we have normalized something that is utterly tragic and terrifying? the lack of humanity and consideration.
needless to say, i’m not suggesting that you stay in places where you don’t want to be, or in situations that don’t feel good to you. i’m just saying, when you leave, if you do, at least say goodbye. treat people like you would like to be treated, right?

after every story, i find myself in a new battle with my faith. my faith in people.
but so far i have always refused to believe absolutely no one cares, there has to be someone who does care. so i guess she’s staying, at least for now.

x🌙