When You Feel There’s Nothing in Life Anymore

When You Feel There’s Nothing in Life Anymore

It’s time to look inward.

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We often come to some points in our lives when we feel life is empty. There’s nothing in life. Life seems meaningless. Then thoughts like ‘why am I living?’, ‘what’s the point?’, ‘why should I live?’ come flocking in our minds. If you have gone through such a phase, you’d understand how a person feels at this point. Everything seems worthless. A deep melancholy sets in. Many succumb to depression. 

If such a phase comes, it’s time to look inward. Life is actually pretty meaningless, if truth be told. There’s no intrinsic purpose to anything. Universe doesn’t function out of purpose. But we are creatures of meaning. Without some meaning we cannot live. Through scientific discoveries, through religion, through God, through heaven and hell, man is perpetually searching for meaning. What is life? What’s the point of it all? So, we create our own meanings, our own purposes, and we live according to that. And on what things we build our meanings? People, property, money, home, relationships, our dreams and on our aspirations. But all this is subject to change, and sooner or later, we’ll lose something or other. That’s a fact. So, quite foolishly, we build our sand castles always near the shore. Mature souls slowly come to realise that there’s no security in the outside world. It’s unstable, always going through changes. And when a big wave of life thrashes our sand castles, we become crestfallen. Life seems tragic. We have invested our hopes in things which are bound to collapse one day. 

But all this is but a lecture to us. And who likes lectures? Knowledge often fails us to overcome grief and suffering. Words of solace doesn’t help much. Counselling or therapy only do that much. When suffering overpowers us, nothing seems to help. Even God seems very far. In these times, we are completely on our own. These are the times when we must seriously look at ourselves. We must look inwards.

The suffering, the helplessness, the agony—all are inside. So, the solution cannot be found outside. We must travel inwards…where all the suffering is. But the problem is, nobody has taught us how to look inward. Nobody knows. So, nobody can help. Everyone is already caught up in the things of the external world. We are all alone here. The inward journey is a lonely one. Even the person you love the most cannot help you there. Only he can help who has gone inward himself. But, again, such people are rare. There are gurus. But, that is a different ball game altogether. We don’t take a guru to be free from our struggles and sufferings. We go to a guru to grow spiritually, to be free from the game of life itself. The role of a guru is not that of a doctor. Guru is a fire. You must be willing to burn yourself completely if you must take a guru. 

So, we are all on self-help really. If you already have a guru, fantastic. But, if you don’t have one, don’t look for gurus. Sit down and reflect. Try to go to the root of the problem. You don’t need any philosophy book or scripture to look at yourself. Learn to look. Observe intently. Keep looking at it until you fully understand. If you give enough attention, everything will be revealed to you. 

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Thank you.