There are people who have everything and feel nothing.
The successful executive who wakes up at 3 AM wondering what it’s all for. The entrepreneur who built a seven-figure business and can’t shake the feeling that none of it matters. The professional who checked every box society told them to check and still feels empty.
They don’t have a success problem. They have a meaning problem.
And meaning, it turns out, isn’t something you find in a promotion or a bank account. It’s something else entirely.
The Existential Crisis No One Talks About
Here’s what nobody tells you about achievement: it doesn’t cure existential dread.
The belief persists that once you get the degree, the job, the house, the relationship—once you finally “make it”—the gnawing sense of meaninglessness will disappear.
It doesn’t.
Because achievement answers the question “Am I successful?”
But it doesn’t answer the question that actually keeps you up at night: “What’s the point?”
This is the existential crisis of modern life. We’ve optimized everything—productivity, health, wealth, relationships—but we’ve forgotten to ask why we’re optimizing in the first place.
We’re climbing ladders without asking if they’re leaning against the right wall.
Existence Precedes Essence
Jean-Paul Sartre said something that pisses people off: “Existence precedes essence.”
Here’s what he meant:
You exist first. You’re thrown into the world with no inherent purpose, no cosmic instruction manual, no predetermined meaning.
Your essence—who you are, what you’re for—comes after. You create it.
This terrifies people.
Because if there’s no inherent meaning, no divine plan, no “everything happens for a reason”—then you’re responsible for creating your own meaning. And that responsibility is heavy as hell.
Most people would rather believe in fate, destiny, “the universe has a plan.” It’s easier. It removes the burden of choice.
But it also removes your freedom.
Sartre’s point isn’t nihilistic. It’s liberating. You’re not stuck with some pre-assigned purpose you have to discover. You get to choose what matters.
The meaning isn’t out there waiting to be found.
You build it.
The Leap of Faith
Søren Kierkegaard understood this differently, but arrived at something similar.
He talked about the “leap of faith”—the moment when rational analysis fails and you have to choose what you believe, what you commit to, what you’re willing to stake your life on.
You can’t prove it’s the right choice. You can’t guarantee it will work out. You can’t eliminate the uncertainty.
You just have to leap.
Most people never leap. They stand at the edge, analyzing, preparing, waiting for certainty that never comes.
There’s a pattern: people who spend years “figuring out” what they should do with their lives. Reading books. Taking courses. Waiting for clarity.
But clarity doesn’t come from thinking. It comes from choosing.
Kierkegaard knew this. You don’t find meaning through endless deliberation. You find it through commitment—even when you’re scared, even when you’re uncertain, even when you can’t prove it’s “right.”
You leap. And in the leaping, you create your essence.
Logotherapy: Meaning as Survival
Viktor Frankl took this from philosophy to lived experience.
In Man’s Search for Meaning, Frankl describes surviving Auschwitz—not because he was stronger or luckier than others, but because he had something to live for.
He had a meaning that sustained him even in hell.
Frankl observed something crucial in the camps: people who lost their sense of meaning died faster. Not just metaphorically. Literally. They’d give up, stop eating, walk into the electric fence.
But those who held onto meaning—whether it was reuniting with loved ones, finishing unfinished work, bearing witness to atrocity—survived at higher rates.
Meaning wasn’t just philosophical. It was physiological.
This became the basis of logotherapy: the idea that the primary human drive isn’t pleasure (Freud) or power (Adler), but meaning.
Frankl’s insight: You can endure almost anything if you have a strong enough why.
But here’s the part most people miss: the meaning doesn’t have to be grand. It doesn’t have to be saving the world or curing cancer.
It can be as simple as “I’m going to finish this book.” Or “I’m going to see my daughter again.” Or “I’m going to document this so others know what happened.”
The content of the meaning matters less than the fact that you have one.
Sisyphus and the Absurd
Albert Camus gave us Sisyphus.
You know the story: Sisyphus is condemned by the gods to push a boulder up a mountain for eternity. Every time he gets close to the top, the boulder rolls back down. He starts over. Forever.
It’s the ultimate symbol of absurdity. Meaningless, repetitive, futile labor.
Most people read this as tragedy.
Camus read it as triumph.
His essay The Myth of Sisyphus ends with one of the most defiant lines in philosophy:
“One must imagine Sisyphus happy.”
Happy? Pushing a boulder up a mountain forever? How?
Because Sisyphus accepts the absurdity. He doesn’t deny it, doesn’t rage against it, doesn’t wait for the gods to give him a different task.
He owns it.
The boulder is his. The mountain is his. The struggle is his.
And in that acceptance—in that ownership—he finds freedom.
Camus is saying: Life is absurd. There’s no cosmic meaning, no grand purpose handed down from on high. You’re Sisyphus. We all are.
But you get to decide how you push the boulder.
You can push it resentfully, waiting for it to mean something.
Or you can push it because you’ve decided this is your boulder.
The meaning isn’t in reaching the top. The meaning is in the pushing—if you choose to make it meaningful.
Loki’s Torment and Chosen Suffering
Norse mythology gives us another image: Loki, bound to a rock, with venom dripping onto his face for eternity. His wife, Sigyn, holds a bowl to catch the venom. But when the bowl fills and she has to empty it, the venom falls on Loki’s face and he writhes in agony.
It’s another image of endless suffering.
But here’s what’s interesting: Sigyn chooses to stay. She could leave. She chooses the suffering—not because she’s forced to, but because holding that bowl is her meaning.
This is the paradox: chosen suffering is different from imposed suffering.
When you choose your struggle—when you decide this is worth suffering for—the suffering transforms.
The pattern emerges everywhere. Two people can do the same difficult work. One is miserable because they feel trapped. The other is energized because they’ve chosen it.
Same work. Different meaning.
The difference isn’t the work. It’s the choice.
The Absurdity is the Point
Here’s what all of these—Sartre, Kierkegaard, Frankl, Camus, the myths—are telling us:
Life doesn’t come with built-in meaning. It’s absurd. It’s uncertain. It’s often suffering.
And that’s actually good news.
Because if there’s no predetermined meaning, you’re free to create your own.
If existence precedes essence, you’re not stuck with who you were “supposed” to be. You can choose.
If the boulder is going to roll back down anyway, you might as well push it on your terms.
The absurdity isn’t a bug. It’s a feature.
It means you’re not constrained by cosmic purpose or divine mandate or societal expectations about what should matter.
You get to decide.
Meaning Makes You Live Longer (Literally)
This isn’t just philosophy. It’s biology.
Research consistently shows that people with a strong sense of purpose live longer.
Studies on aging populations show that having a reason to get up in the morning—what the Japanese call ikigai—reduces mortality risk by significant margins.
People with purpose have:
- Lower rates of cardiovascular disease
- Better cognitive function in old age
- Faster recovery from illness
- Lower rates of depression and anxiety
- Longer lifespans overall
Frankl was right: meaning isn’t just psychological comfort. It’s a survival mechanism.
Your body knows the difference between existing and living for something.
When you have meaning, your biology responds. Your immune system functions better. Your stress response regulates more effectively. Your brain stays sharper longer.
It’s as if your body asks: “Is this person here for a reason? Should we keep maintaining this organism?”
And if the answer is yes—if you have something you’re living for—your body invests in your survival.
If the answer is no, your body starts the slow shutdown.
This is why retirement kills people. Not the lack of work, but the lack of meaning that work provided.
This is why wealthy people who “have everything” still struggle with depression and addiction. Achievement without meaning is just elaborate distraction.
You can have all the success in the world and still be dying inside—literally—if you don’t have a reason to be alive.
It Doesn’t Matter What It Is
Here’s the liberating part: the specific content of your meaning doesn’t matter nearly as much as you think.
You don’t need to cure cancer or end poverty or change the world.
Your meaning can be:
- Raising your kids well
- Building a business you’re proud of
- Mastering a craft
- Creating art nobody will ever see
- Being a good friend
- Documenting your life honestly
- Helping one person at a time
- Simply bearing witness to existence
Frankl’s meaning in Auschwitz was surviving to tell the story and reunite with his wife.
Camus’s Sisyphus finds meaning in the boulder itself.
Your meaning might be something nobody else understands or values.
That’s fine. It’s yours.
The only requirement is that you’ve chosen it. That you’ve decided this is worth your time, your energy, your life.
Because here’s the secret: meaning isn’t about the thing itself. It’s about your relationship to it.
It’s about choosing something and saying, “This matters. Because I’ve decided it matters.”
The Work You’re Meant to Do
The question comes up constantly: “How do I find my purpose? What am I meant to do?”
Wrong question.
You’re not meant to do anything. There’s no cosmic assignment.
Better question: “What am I willing to choose? What suffering am I willing to accept? What boulder am I willing to push?”
Because you’re going to push a boulder either way. You’re going to suffer either way. You’re going to struggle either way.
The question is whether you’re pushing your boulder or someone else’s.
Whether you’re suffering for something you’ve chosen or something that was chosen for you.
Whether you’re Sisyphus pushing resentfully, waiting for the gods to give you a different task—or Sisyphus pushing defiantly, owning the absurdity, making the boulder yours.
You’re meant to do the work you choose to do.
Not because fate dictated it. Not because society approved it. Not because it’s objectively “important.”
But because you looked at the absurdity of existence and said: “Fine. This is my boulder. This is what I’m here for. This is what makes it worth getting up.”
That choice—that commitment—is where meaning lives.
Accept the Absurd, Choose Your Meaning
Life is absurd. There’s no avoiding that.
You’re going to die. Everyone you love is going to die. Most of what you build will crumble. The universe doesn’t care about your plans.
You can rage against this. You can deny it. You can distract yourself from it with achievement and consumption and endless optimization.
Or you can accept it.
And in that acceptance, you can find a strange kind of freedom.
Because if nothing matters objectively, then what you choose to matter becomes everything.
If existence precedes essence, you get to write your essence.
If the boulder is going to roll back down anyway, you might as well enjoy the climb.
If meaning isn’t given, you get to create it.
This is the existential truth nobody wants to hear and everybody needs to know:
You’re not going to find meaning. You’re going to build it.
You’re not going to discover your purpose. You’re going to choose it.
And once you choose—once you commit, once you leap, once you accept the absurdity and push your boulder anyway—something shifts.
Life doesn’t become easy. It becomes yours.
And that ownership, that choice, that meaning you’ve created—that’s what makes a life worth living.
That’s what makes you want to stay alive.
That’s what makes Sisyphus happy.