I have a new purpose

To be nobody.

Seinfeld has a standup bit where he says, “We men are the superheroes of our own little universes.” Something like that. “Want proof?” he continues, “You’ve all seen the guy driving down the street with a mattress tied to the roof of the car. And without fail, he has his arm hanging out the window holding the mattress. Because when the wind catches this giant foam rectangle at 70 miles per hour, don’t worry sweetheart, I got it.”

We all experience our worlds like that to some extent. We’re the center of our realities. We absorb information, the information passes through the filter of our experiences, we make choices, we make things happen, we are at cause in the universe.

Or so we think. We forget this perception only exists in our minds. And that everyone else is walking around with the same delusion of their own central role. In actuality, we’re just one in a sea of billions. And over time, nothing about us will be the least bit significant. If Elon Musk or President Obama happen to be reading this, you gentlemen as well. Revered as you are for your influence and contributions, you are only slightly less insignificant than the rest of us.

The known universe contains one septillion stars (a one followed by 24 zeroes) and a lot of those stars contain a handful more blobs of dust we call planets. If you got hit by a bus tomorrow, little would change beyond the emotional states of the people in your immediate circle. The earth would keep spinning rapidly on its axis. The laws of nature would not change, nor would this infinite sea of entropy in which we are but a fraction of a ripple.

People generally don’t like hearing that. It doesn’t really jive with the stories we tell ourselves. Like mattress guy, we think we’re special. That we can outsmart physics. Our parents didn’t raise us to be insignificant specs of stardust. What kind of downer childhood would that be? What kind of cynical outlook is this for anyone to have at any age? You might think. Well, you would be wrong. The truth is, it’s not cynical at all. To acknowledge what is unimportant actually frees us from the grips of the self-centered voice in our heads that’s responsible for a great deal of our suffering.

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