m y . t h o u g h t s . o n . t h i n g s

written in spring 2001:
OK. I've been thinking for a while now, and I can't quite figure out the point to it all. I mean, Why? Even the simple word, Why? doesn't begin to explain the deepness of this question. Over the course of the years, I'm sure many people have pondered and even written books about this question. I know I'm not the first one to think about this. But it's not just the meaning of life I'm talking about here, but the meaning of meaning. Why. I just explained that this word is too simple for the questions it asks, and yet, I'm left with nothing more to say. Why?

I sound like one of those little kids who annoy their parents to no end by constantly asking "Why?" after everything that's said. But that's how I feel. And this is a boundary which I cannot cross. I wish it was only an obstacle, for an obstacle can be overcome. What I feel is that I'm at the edge of the world, if there were such a thing. There's really no where to go because beyond "Why?" there is nothing. No answers that can't again be followed by the simple and yet perpetually agonizing "Why?"

This one question, "Why?" is probably the single greatest thing that leads me to want to believe in God. Because, if there is a God, the impassable boundary of "Why?" would no longer exist. God would be every answer; any answerless question could be passed off to God as something that He knows and has taken care of. I wouldn't have to think so much then. And yet, even with a belief in God, many answerless questions still arise. I think that's why I came away from believing in God, because even though he should be The Answer, I was still left w/too many questions.

I felt that if I began looking for answers myself, instead of passing them off to a God who couldn't be the answer for them, I might pass this impassable boundary of "Why?". Unexpectedly, though, once I started asking "Why?", I became overwhelmed with the deepness of it. It can overtake you. It's as though the first "Why?" begins to multiply itself until there are so many Why?'s that there's no more rational thought left in you. You begin to plummet into this infinite spiral of questions; you almost feel as though you're drowning in them.

Sometimes I can completely understand what crazy people must feel like. Sometimes I think I'm crazy.

I hate feeling that way. I've begun to hate thinking. Thinking is almost completely synonymous with questioning. And I hate where the answerless questions lead me. I want to go back into believing in a God, in a purpose for everything, but I don't have belief left in me. I can't believe in anything anymore, for I never find answers to the questions and I can't ignore the desire in me to know the truth. I can never fully believe for I will consistently doubt.

And even if I did believe, what would be the point of it? Why should I have a reason to life and answers to my questions? Why do I care about these things? Why do I ask Why? I guess I ask for the same reason I don't receive an answer:

Because.

That's the answer to a lot of things. It doesn't really satisfy the question, but it provides a word, some letters, anything, that stands on the other side of that word I've begun to loathe: WHY? And somehow, though the word "because" carries no real meaning, it gives me hope knowing that if it can cross that impassable boundary, perhaps something else someday also will be able to cross. Perhaps someday I will have an answer.

But, for now, I just wait. For what, I have no clue. But I don't know what else to do. I could write out all these unexplainable things; I could try and make sense of it all. But what would be the point of that, I don't know. Why try to explain the unexplainable? Why try to do anything? Why live? WHY?

Because.

last updated:
9/21/04