Before having children, I almost never thought about children.
Of course, I knew they existed.
I knew people wanted them, loved them, worried about them, sacrificed for them.
I understood all of that intellectually.
But my own children?
They simply weren’t part of my world.
Then, somehow, they appeared.
And once they did, something strange happened.
Life changed.
Not gradually. Not philosophically. Practically.
Suddenly there were people whose existence could make me think, without hesitation:
“I love you more than anything.”
And yet, strangely, those same people could sometimes make me think:
“I don’t know if I can do this anymore.”
Both thoughts can exist in the same person.
Perhaps that’s one of the strangest things about having children.
Love doesn’t make caring for someone easy.
In fact, perhaps it makes it harder, because now there is something enormous at stake.
Before they existed, there was nothing to worry about.
After they existed, there was everything to worry about.
And that made me think about something darker.
If attachment can bring so much love, it can also bring so much suffering.
There are parents who lose their children and feel that they have lost a part of themselves.
There are also parents who become so exhausted, overwhelmed, isolated, or desperate that they hurt the very children they love.
It is difficult to hold those two realities in the same mind.
The same relationship can contain an almost unimaginable amount of love and an almost unimaginable amount of suffering.
And then another thought appeared.
If having something gives you something to lose, wouldn’t having nothing be more peaceful?
Perhaps the most peaceful life is the life with nothing.
Nothing to possess.
Nothing to protect.
Nothing to lose.
No expectations.
No responsibilities.
No one whose safety can keep you awake at night.
No one whose death could break you.
At the extreme, the idea almost seems mathematically elegant.
If suffering comes from attachment, then eliminate attachment.
If loss hurts because you have something, then have nothing.
And if having nothing is peaceful, then perhaps the ultimate peaceful state is…
never having existed at all.
That thought is strangely difficult to argue against.
Before I was born, I had no problems.
I had no responsibilities.
I had no fear.
I had no disappointment.
I didn’t miss anything.
Of course, there was also no “me” there to enjoy the peace.
And that’s where the thought starts to fold in on itself.
Because I am already here.
I cannot return to the state of never having existed.
And eventually, whether I want it or not, I will die.
Everyone does.
That much is certain.
What isn’t certain is what happens afterward.
And this is where things become uncomfortable.
Nobody really knows.
Some people believe there is an afterlife.
Some believe in reincarnation.
Some believe in heaven or hell.
Some believe consciousness simply ends.
Some believe something else entirely.
People sometimes speak about these things as though they know.
But believing something and knowing something are not the same thing.
Perhaps they believe because their religion teaches it.
Perhaps because they had an experience.
Perhaps because they need the answer.
Perhaps because the alternative is frightening.
Perhaps because they simply cannot tolerate an unanswered question.
I don’t know which, if any, is true.
And neither, as far as I can tell, does anyone else.
For a while, that kind of uncertainty can lead to a peculiar thought:
If nobody knows, then why should I care?
If I don’t know what happens after death, and nobody else really knows either, why should I spend energy worrying about it?
If the ultimate answer is unknowable, perhaps nothing matters.
But something about that conclusion feels wrong.
Then I thought about Schrödinger’s cat.
Not the actual physics, because I am not trying to explain quantum mechanics here.
I’m thinking about the idea as a metaphor.
Imagine a cat inside a box.
You don’t know whether the cat is alive or dead.
You cannot see it.
You don’t have the information.
You don’t know its state.
But there is one thing you do know:
there is a cat in the box.
The uncertainty about its state does not make the cat disappear.
And perhaps I had been making a similar mistake with life.
I was taking:
“I don’t know.”
and somehow turning it into:
“Therefore, it doesn’t matter.”
But those aren’t the same statement.
I don’t know what happens after death.
That doesn’t mean death doesn’t matter.
I don’t know whether there is an afterlife.
That doesn’t mean the people alive right now don’t matter.
I don’t know whether the universe has an ultimate purpose.
That doesn’t mean today’s experiences are meaningless.
I don’t know whether there is some answer waiting beyond the limits of human understanding.
But I do know that I am here.
The cat is here.
And that changes the question.
Perhaps I don’t need to choose a religion simply because I am afraid of uncertainty.
Perhaps I don’t need to declare that there is no meaning simply because I cannot prove that there is meaning.
Perhaps I can just say:
I don’t know.
And leave the door open.
There is something strangely liberating about that.
Not knowing doesn’t necessarily require indifference.
It can produce curiosity instead.
Nobody knows what is inside the box.
Fine.
Then watch the box.
Stay curious.
See what happens.
Maybe that’s a better response to existence than trying to solve it before allowing yourself to live it.
Because there are so many things I don’t know.
I don’t know why I exist.
I don’t know why consciousness exists.
I don’t know whether the universe has a purpose.
I don’t know what happens after death.
I don’t know whether there is something beyond what we can perceive.
I don’t know whether any religion has the final answer.
But I know my children exist.
I know they will grow.
I know they will change.
I know there will be days when they drive me completely crazy.
I know there will probably be days when I look at them and think, again, without needing an explanation:
“I love you more than anything.”
I know that tomorrow will arrive unless something prevents it.
I know I am alive today.
Those things don’t become meaningless simply because I don’t know the answer to the biggest question.
Maybe we have been asking the wrong question.
Instead of:
“What is the ultimate meaning of life?”
perhaps sometimes the better question is:
“What is actually here?”
And then:
“What do I want to do with it?”
I don’t know what the cat’s state is.
I don’t know what is waiting at the end of the story.
I don’t even know whether there is an end in the way I imagine it.
But there is a cat.
The box is here.
And I’m still here, looking at it.
So I think I’ll keep watching. Because the cat is still there.