Their Ideas Mixed With A Little Bit Of Yazmin

The idea of cool is abstract. There can be many thoughts and ideas said to describe it, many actions and reactions to describe it but what is it actually? And what does this cool do for us?

Many philosophers, psychologists, and social theorists are telling us that this idea of coolness is an attempt to hide the emptiness inside of us. Kind of like a band aid (quoting Andy) that is there to act as a protector for our injury but yet cannot keep us from forgetting that it is there.

So I am here now to talk about the source of this sense of meaningless. How we came about with it and how possibly we can get rid of it if we find the initial problem. I have researched and will talk about the Myth of the Fall, of Freud's theories of separation from the mother, and of Becker's theory of the fear of annihilation in death and then make my hypothesis on the sense of meaningless.

So first we must talk about the Myth of the Fall. This is about Adam and Eve and how the original sin was what disconnected us from God and therefore from ourselves. This disconnection from God gives us this sense of meaningless and until we are connected once again with God we will not be able to fill this emptiness. My opinion is that this could indeed be the source for our sense of meaningless because before the original sin we were meaningful in God’s eyes and we were part of him and the universe forever to be immortal. Now that the original sin has taken place we are one for all and able to choose whether we want to be good or bad without it really meaning anything.

This separation from God brings me to my next topic about the separation from our mothers bringing this sense of meaningless. Freud says that when we are babies we do not realize that we are separate beings from our mother. In fact we think that we are one with our mother and that everything in the universe is connected. It is not until we get older or ignored that we realize we are alone and not connected to our mother’s internal being. To me this seems perfectly normal to think about because I have a younger brother who is 7 months old. I don’t think he has yet to realize that everything is separate and everyone is here for themselves. He still has this loving attitude for his mom that is not to be tampered with at any moment. He searches for her and hugs her and kisses her with so much love and innocence that it almost makes this theory have to be true. Children at this age still do not know that we are not here forever and in life as pawns rather than creators.

Finally with this we reach Becker’s theory of annihilation of death. His theory is that we act “cool” and try to ignore the awareness of death that we have. Because we are aware that eventually we will die however we try to do as much as possible and make our lives as meaningful as possible that we in turn create this emptiness inside of us which we continue trying to fill with doing more things. To me this can also be a source for the sense of meaningless we have because people do try to make a difference in the world because they realize eventually that they are going to die and don’t want to go to waste without being remembered or leaving something that will make them be remembered.

My hypothesis is that the source of meaningless we have inside comes from always following the script that we are given and never really having anything special enough in our lives to make us feel as if we are different. For example, our parents are always telling us how we should be and what we should do. We follow what they want us to do because we want their approval and think that that is the only way to get it because it’s what they want. Like we are always waiting for the next cue in life or the next step and we are constantly waiting for someone to tell us what it is. We go from school to college to marriage to parenthood to retirement. There’s nothing important about what we are doing because someone before us has already done it. Knowing this could create this emptiness because we feel as if no matter what we do, it makes no difference in anyone else’s life and eventually when we die that one decision will have not made a difference because we’re gone.