The desire to cease to exist

I think that a rarely discussed but commonly felt desire is to simply not exist. This should of course be distinguished from its far more violent and permanent cousin; an act that admittedly still holds tightly to this longing for nothingness. But the former sensation is far more vague. To not have to experience this anymore. To never have been born. To go to sleep forever. I feel it when I'm embarrassed or ashamed. House parties with strangers. Social rejection. Isolation.

Sometimes, at its heaviest, it springs forth from the paranoid pondering of solitary thought: would I want to live on a dying Earth? Am I a burden to others? Am I enough? And sometimes I simply find myself condemned within a mind of misery and anguish, with no apparent point of origin to these insufferable feelings. Within me emerges a deep longing to not be there and, sometimes, to not be anywhere.

In these moments the hypothetical comfort of losing all awareness and sensation can be a little too inviting. Which is quite strange in a sense. In the presence of immense suffering and discomfort, we find this capacity to fetishize oblivion. "Fetish" is an appropriate word here as it denotes the obsessive and frantic pursuit of a fantasy that will likely fail to live up to its hype. However, the pursuit itself, the fetishization, is already of such immense degree that this promise of dissatisfaction is soon forgotten. And the struggle continues.

But with this unique pursuit towards nothingness, we reach a radical attempt at this fantasy of non-being. If we succeed, we will never experience it fully. And that's kind of the point. We won't be satisfied. We simply won't be anything. But the escape hatch is always there. All that's needed are a few carefully drawn-out plans and more often than not some substance of pacification. The idea that one could step out, the fetishized alternative to finally exit, lingers at every corner of self-hatred, boredom, despair, and fatigue. I suppose it's this feeling that we have some autonomy despite it all. We have a say in the matter. But I'm always several steps behind in the practical planning process. And the moment of longing rarely lasts. It makes little sense. One moment of freedom for an eternity of nothing. Of permanent silence. Is this a worthy sacrifice?

I think not. There are enough paths to experience this "nothingness" while still being able to stick around. Sure there are those mini-deaths we engage in when life becomes too much. I scroll Instagram, sink into a burger, and plunge into conscious nothingness. But rarely do I feel better afterward. These small retreats from torment fo little in the face of this godly ability to self-reflect on my own insignificance.

Fortunately, there are also just enough moments I've experienced in my life that have made me feel this prospect of escape and simultaneously feel a preference for being over nothingness if that makes sense. Moments of the sublime. Of pure awe in the face of something larger than myself. I'm nothing in the presence of a beautiful song or piece of art or moments of shared connection between friends and lovers or making something that others enjoy and perhaps even relate to.

Those fleeting seconds that force me to stare into the fragility of it all; to realize that being itself is pure chance. My own existence is a brief moment awake. I'm barely anything to begin with. And that's perfectly fine. Because at every moment awaits some beautiful potentiality I am not yet prepared for. And I know this because I have experienced it before. But if I give up now there's no going back. Non-existence will come to me soon enough. So why not stick it out for just a little bit longer?