Living Like Nothing Matters
I&#x27;ve read books whose gist is the same point this author makes, and I agree it&#x27;s such a freeing realization.<p>Out of the estimated 117 billion[1] humans who have walked the Earth, how many who have died can we actually name off the top of our heads?  A few hundred at best?  Maybe a few thousand if you&#x27;re a history buff?  And of that group, how many will still be remembered at the heat death of the universe?  I&#x27;d bet money that the answer is &quot;none of them&quot;.<p>So what&#x27;s the point of trying to be remembered or leave a legacy?  It&#x27;s a game that we&#x27;re destined to lose, so why play?  Personally, I don&#x27;t care how big my gravestone is, or whether I have my name on the side of a building, or whether I have an element in the periodic table named after me.  Because it&#x27;ll all come crumbling down in the end.  This too shall pass.<p>And rather than being depressing, it&#x27;s actually liberating.  It means I&#x27;m done climbing the corporate ladder.  It means I can work just hard enough to pay the bills at my day job, while leaving ample free time to engage with creative pursuits that satisfy me.  It means I can have kids if it makes me happy, but I don&#x27;t feel pressured to out of a sense of &quot;continuing the family line&quot; or some other bullshit.<p>No matter how hard I try, literally nothing you or I do will be remembered on a long enough timespan.  Hell, I don&#x27;t even know the names of my great-grandparents, and chances are that, if I ever have kids, my great-grandkids won&#x27;t remember mine.  It&#x27;s like Carl Sagan&#x27;s &quot;Pale Blue Dot&quot; quote[2].  I don&#x27;t know what the meaning of life is, but I&#x27;m pretty sure it&#x27;s not &quot;try to wrest some sort of immortality by being remembered after you&#x27;re gone&quot;.<p>1. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.prb.org&#x2F;articles&#x2F;how-many-people-have-ever-lived-on-earth&#x2F;#:~:text=This major change in our,ever been born on Earth" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.prb.org&#x2F;articles&#x2F;how-many-people-have-ever-lived...</a>.<p>2. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.planetary.org&#x2F;worlds&#x2F;pale-blue-dot" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.planetary.org&#x2F;worlds&#x2F;pale-blue-dot</a>