The Philosophy of Existentialism

The Terrible Gift

To begin, let’s imagine you are standing in a field. An infinite field, under a silent sky. There are no maps, no signposts, no paths worn into the grass by those who came before. No one sent you here. There is no destination you are *supposed* to find. There is only you, the open space, and the crushing, absolute freedom to walk in any direction. This is the unsettling landscape of existentialism. At its heart lies a simple, yet profoundly disruptive idea: *existence precedes essence*. For most of history, thinkers believed the opposite. They argued that "essence precedes existence." An acorn’s essence, for instance, is to become an oak tree. A knife’s essence is to be a cutting tool, a purpose given to it by its creator. Humanity, too, was thought to have an essence—a pre-defined nature, a soul, a divine purpose bestowed by God. Then, a group of thinkers, particularly in the wake of war-torn, mid-20th century Europe, looked at the world and saw the traditional signposts shattered. For philosophers like Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, and Albert Camus, the old certainties were gone. If there is no divine creator, no cosmic plan, then we are not like the knife, designed with a purpose in mind. We simply *are*. We are thrown into existence first, arriving without a script or a blueprint. Our essence—what we are—is not something we are given. It is something we must build ourselves, choice by choice, action by action. "Man first of all exists, encounters himself, surges up in the world—and defines himself afterwards," Sartre wrote. This is the terrible, electrifying gift of existentialism: you are the sole author of your own meaning.