existentialism

An Introduction to Philosophy (RLL style) Week 15 – Meaning of Life – Part 4: Did you make your bed?

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What if you only had a limited number of days left? Would you make them count? Every day, we live with death in the room, but instead of fearing it, we can use it to sharpen our lives. Making your bed existentially means living fully today—choosing presence, boldness, and engagement over procrastination and hesitation. Carpe diem isn’t about recklessness; it’s about living with courage. If today were your last clean page, would you have written something worth rereading?

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An Introduction to Philosophy (RLL style) Week 15 – Meaning of Life – Part 1: Introduction – How long do you want to live?

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We all know we’re going to die. It’s the one certainty in life. But what if we could live forever, like the immortal jellyfish? Would we want that? Would the urgency of living fade if time no longer had a limit? The real question isn’t how long we live, but how we live. Time is the one resource we can’t replace, and it’s up to us to make it count. What makes a life feel full? And if you knew your time was short, would you feel like you’d shown up for it?

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An Introduction to Philosophy (RLL style) Week 10 – God 2 (Atheism) – Part 5: Do you believe in Santa Claus?

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Freud suggested that religion, much like the story of Santa Claus, isn’t necessarily a harmful lie, but an illusion born of need. It provides structure to chaos, comfort in the face of an unpredictable world, and offers a cosmic parent figure to protect us. Religion, then, is a psychological shelter—something that helps us cope with our existential fears. As societies evolve, the gods evolve with them—goddesses became gods, and the authority of the divine mirrored shifts in social power. Freud’s sharp insight: belief in God isn’t always about truth—it’s about reassurance. But if God were invented, not discovered, what does that say about the universe, and about ourselves?

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