Have you developed an existentialist mindset?

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I am only very young but in recent years have developed an existentialist mindset.

I can't help but think life is totally pointless and meaningless.

I also have feelings of depersonalization and derealization. I sometimes feel like this world isn't real, this reality is too constructed, artificial and fake feeling, etc.

I'm not depressed or anything though. I think we should still live life to the fullest. We might as well live life to the fullest in this tiny, tiny little time we have on this planet than just end it now.

Still I've begun to realize just how much I 'drift' through life, especially things like school. I literally put the bare minimum effort into everything to succeed because I'm so apathetic and unmotivated to excel. I'm satisfied with barely trying and getting a C- for example.

Not just school but relationships and friendships as well. There's only a tiny little fraction of people I speak to and am very satisfied with this. Most of them I don't have very strong friendships or relationships with either. My family of course I love them and spend time with them but I also spend a minimal amount of my attention in their lives.

Either way all this conformity gets drilled into my head and I can't stand it. At school they're always mentioning about how we find our 'purpose' in life, how we find meaning. How we 'contribute' as a citizen, as a member of the community, etc. It's starting to get annoying. I'm also a socialist but no I do not believe in this 'find meaning in your life to be a part of your world!! Your great, big, exciting, happy world of meaning and purpose!!' stuff.

Anyway enough about me.

So, are you an existentialist? Could it even be an Aspie thing that we are more inclined to these types of philosophies? Or do you think it's not and we can all have different philosophical views? What do you think?

What's your story/when did you start feeling you were an existentialist, why, and how has it changed your perspective on the world?

Absolutely. I think life and existence is all a big coincidence, with no real reason for being here. I mean, one may as well try to enjoy their life, because what else is there, really?

I'm not existentialist, I'm more of a stoic, if anything.

I don't care about the meaning of life. Just the fact that I am alive is enough for me. Why would I bother about purpose when I can just watch the surrounding world as it is? The would itself is interesting enough, it doesn't need a purpose. I don't need any "meaning of life" to feel fulfilled. All I need to do is making the best use of what I have and don't worry too much about what I don't have. I can get what I don't have using what I have if i choose to and if it's possible to me. I just don't worry much about getting what is impossible or too troublesome to get.

I changed my view on life when I was in middle school and I realized bullies cannot hurt me if I don't consider them hurting. I was like "Ueeeee, why do they do it to me?! Why are they so cruel!? What did I do to deserve that!?" but then I started thinking "Oh, well. If that's how it is let it be. It's not like they do much damage most of the time, I can stand it. If they try to do something dangerous or really distracting I can stop them as long as I stay calm and collected. Getting all fired up doesn't help, it only makes them bully me more.". The bullying stopped pretty soon and I got confident in my opinions and behavior because other people opinions and behavior could no longer hurt me. Feeling hurt is all about your own judgment. Except maybe physical pain but it's also a matter of judgment to a degree. It hurts more when you think you are a helpless victim of the pain, wonder why it happened to you and complain that you wouldn't feel it if you only didn't get hurt at all but it doesn't hurt that much when you know that the pain is just a direct result of your body being damaged, it will go away as soon as it heals a bit and the damage already happened so thinking "what if" won't make it disappear.

I'm not of a philosophical mindset myself.

I have Epicurean elements, mixed with some Stoic elements.

I don't believe individual lives are "meaningless" in any way.

I used to be somewhat of an existentialist when I was younger, but no longer. I'm more concerned with striving to live a life that is fulfilled and happy. It doesn't have to have a meaning.

I guess I've been pretty existential ever since I was a little kid. I had a mini-existential crisis when I was five, and death has always bothered me ever since. There's really no objective meaning in the universe, however you look at it, because there is nothing that can provide meaning.

That's why you have to make your own meaning. Any meaning in the world is subjective. Because there is no meaning already, you have the freedom to decide what it is. It could be to try to enjoy your life, or find unicorns, or whatever.

I can't say anything about all aspies, because we're all very different, but I think we're more inclined to objective thinking. This and the fact that we're more prone to social isolation probably leads many of us to stop seeing meaning in the world.

Much of the actual physical world is beautiful--especially when it's not disturbed too much by Man.

Yeah, exactly. It's only beautiful because you think it's beautiful. There's no such thing as objective beauty. But that's fine; it's what makes life interesting.

Too often I see people treat life as though the only goal is to earn lots of money/be famous, but life can have any goal you want.

There is such a thing as "relatively" objective Beauty.

Absolute objectivity, obviously, with 7 billion perspectives (and possibly more--since animals could have a philosophical mindset as well), is impossible.

Don't you agree that most people would find a colorful sunset beautiful?

Yeah. I guess it depends on how you define "objective" and "beauty". I guess you could say, objectively, that most humans find sunsets beautiful. But aliens might not. And the universe doesn't.

Well...we would have to bring some aliens to Earth, have them behold the sunset, then ask them about it.

They might think it's a beautiful manifestation of esoteric exotica; they might also believe it's the ugliest thing they ever saw.

But never know that...unless we bring the aliens here.

I guess I believe in laissez-faire when it comes to these matters. To each his/her own.

I think its immature and arrogant to assume that you are qualified to determine whether or not life is meaningless. Just because you don't see the purpose or the pattern doesn't mean it isn't there, it just means your perspective is limited.

Just as you may think as a child that you're being treated unjustly when your parents discipline you, then realize years later that they were in fact teaching you something that would serve you later in life.

You're an immortal consciousness wearing a character mask in a Role Playing Game. The scenes here in the Holodeck may be fictional, but that doesn't mean they have no purpose.

I feel the purpose of humans is to study and learn as much as they can about life and to connect on some level with this undercurrent of energy, to step into various souls and feel their existence and to connect with the universe and to feel that vast expansion.

I fall in line with Camus' Absurdist ideas, which are related.

http://existentialcomics.com/comic/58

I love Existential Comics! Camus is awesome! Have you read The Stranger?