It Could be Worse: Despair and it's Merits

“Despair is the price one pays for self-awareness. Look deeply into life, and you’ll always find despair.” Irvin D. Yalom’s quote here is a sentiment I feel so strongly about that I’m unsure if anything I have to say could add to it. Despair, if we were to classify it simply as an emotion, could be said to be the most agonizing. Despair could be described as the last gasp of a man without any respite. It is a feeling that can only be experienced after everything has been exhausted, after every possible effort has been tried and failed.

Being that it is our nature to survive, hope is usually the last thing to leave us—a yearning to keep on, a hope that is everlasting. And when that hope is lost, there’s nothing else left. We guard against despair  because it’s instinctual to do, and tell ourselves things will get better, that they have to, even if we don’t believe it, because surrendering ourselves to hopelessness is damnation. I don’t disagree, and I would never advise anyone to give in to their despair, but I think its merits are something that must be considered.

I guess it all came to me when I was thinking about the children in Gaza, and once I realized just how deeply it shook me, I asked myself: what amount of therapy could help me reconcile with the reality of genocide? What level of cognitive behavioral therapy would it take for me to come to terms with this fact? It seems that all the time, somebody is trying to convince us that things aren’t actually as bad as they seem and that the world isn’t actually on fire even as our rooms fill with smoke. It’s as if everything around us is created specifically to convince us that things are just fine.  It wouldn’t be so bad if not for the fact that we all know things feel so obviously terrible.

I’m always careful of claims that things are so bad now or of the claim that we’re living in the worst of all times, because im sure for generations past it’s felt just like that. But i can only write from my context  and patient hesitance to proclaim how specifically bad things are now as compared to then has completely dissipated for me in the past few years, and even more rapidly in the past few months. I think we are living in the last gasps of a dying world; I feel the apocalypse is already upon us. All that is left is for us to allow ourselves to realize it. This is chiefly what compelled me to write this—the frustration that we, and I mean all of us, aren’t completely broken by the reality of the world we exist in. We have ample reasons to despair, yet we allow ourselves to ignore them.

The despair that I’m feeling now more than ever, probably had its loose beginning on October 7th. This day, if the media would have you believe, is when Hamas started what is now being finished (I use the word “finished” because there will be nothing left of Gaza after this) by Israel. It isn’t as though I haven’t been wrestling with the feeling of despair pre-October 7, but the weight of things that have happened since then has only solidified my sentiment. The sheer madness of what is being done to the people of Palestine is so obviously cruel that I don’t have the capacity to accept its reality.

Every day I wake up and slowly realize that across the world, a child is being blown to bits. That madness is made even more devastating because the suffering happening there is also happening, and has been happening all across the world. What's been seen in Gaza is the Congo, Yemen, Sudan, Venezuela, and right here in this country. Horrible things are happening everywhere, and the fact that it took this long put this thought to pen is the problem. I should have already written this; I should have already been in a state of crippling emotion—we should have already been there long ago

Over the past year, I’ve had countless conversations with myself about personal responsibility. It stems from the realization that these global problems were neither created by me nor can they be conquered by me alone. At times, I’ve felt so deeply about suffering that it seemed as though I could hear the bombs. There’s a selfishness in that which I’ve always been wary of because no matter how deeply I feel for the children dying across the world, I am exactly that—a world away, safe. So, no matter how terrible I may feel when I think of all the suffering in this world, I soon fall back into the comfort that safety brings.

I wake to the birds chirping, scroll through my phone, get in my car, and go on with my day. There’s no end to the distractions that can fill my calm, comfortable life, and in doing so, the feeling of despair grows further and further away from me, only to return if I so please. Unlike those within the fire, we have the choice to douse the flames. We never really reach the point of desperation because our lives are so far removed from it. How many of us truly know what it feels like to lose every member of our family? How many can really say they have witnessed genocide? We neither have the depth nor the language to even comprehend what those experiences mean. Yet, for some, this is the only reality they know.

If for a second we were to live the lives they live, if for a moment we were to witness what they have seen, we would fall to our knees in an anguish so deep that the world would seem to stop. The world does need to stop; we all should be on our knees. There are too many reasons why. The change that is needed lies right behind the hopelessness. Because if we don’t reach that point, if we aren’t broken now, it means we can take more; it means it isn’t already too bad. If we aren’t at the point of despair yet, what will it take?

It took me some time to revisit this essay. For one, despair is a very uncomfortable emotion. I found myself drifting too deep into it while writing this. And even though that was specifically the point of why I wrote this, it was hard nonetheless. It also came with the feeling of being somewhat of a coward, that I couldn’t sit with the emotion that I was asking the world to sit with. So I stopped. And I wondered what that was an admission of. I fear that my time away from writing this—or rather, the option to take time away from it—will always supersede what is required of us. It isn’t as though just the blatant distractions temper us from feeling the depths that should be felt, but indeed the things we use to tell ourselves are helping are themselves their own distractions. When we repost the latest atrocities and plaster generic quotes that imbue us with the unearned satisfaction that we have done something, we are, in fact, engaging in behavior that is the direct opposite of what is needed. These acts of internet activism are little more than their own brand of escapism; they allow us to feel as though we are somehow contributing to rectifying the ills of the world but really, we aren’t doing a damn thing. It’s even worse: we do nothing and allow ourselves to feel good about it. It’s a conversation best left for its own essay, but these would-be internet activists have a reserved place for my ire. These people carry themselves with a moral superiority so completely unearned that it’s maddening. But I digress; the point remains that both the empathetic and the apathetic are doing what, in the aggregate, amounts to the same result—the world in which we live. One that allows you to be involved, removed, and everything in between, but all the while comfortable.

Ultimately, I don’t think anything will change. In large part, this is why it took me so long to finish writing this—it doesn’t matter, and this essay won’t change anything. We’re absolutely doomed and rightfully so. Whatever occurs from this moment on, no matter how horrid, will be because we allowed it. The worst thing that’s ever happened is happening right now, and yet we still haven’t reached a breaking point. Sadly, it’s an admission. We, myself included, are admitting that even as it feels things couldn’t get any worse, they are, in fact, not bad enough. We are admitting that even as people get executed in their houses, even as bodies pile up, and nations get erased, it still isn’t bad enough. Because if it were, the despair would be so immense it would either tear us apart or force us to create a new reality. That’s unironically the hope: that we feel something so grave we accept that drastic measures need to be taken. But I’m under no illusion; there are more things standing in the way of a new beginning now more than ever. One can more efficiently distract and insulate themselves from that which might cause any sense of discomfort. We have jobs, money to spend, restaurants to visit, friends to see, and even if we don’t have that, we have a phone to watch those who do. So you see, it’ll never feel as bad as it needs to; it’ll always seem like there is a tomorrow. What terrifies me the most is the prospect of what it would take for us to realize tomorrow isn’t guaranteed. But alas, I’ve resigned myself to the fact that nothing will change. There’ll never be enough of us who truly feel within our bosom that it can’t go on like this. I suppose it can get worse, and I know it will, but even then, still, apathy will reign supreme. We can watch the world crumble from our flat-screen TVs; we can die not knowing how miserable we have left this planet. Indeed, I do not think even the despair I espouse will motivate us. We are doomed, and we deserve it.

I began writing this on the way to see my nephew and niece, my two most favorite things in the world. I thought about the world that I wanted to leave behind and how I was contributing to it. I took my nephew to the playground, then I bought ice cream; I watched him have the time of his life. When I’m with them, it’s hard to give in to despair; it’s hard to feel despondent in the face of a child, because the very idea of children is hope. They remind us that life springs eternal and the future lies in their soft, radiant faces. My sister’s children give me hope. They allow me to imagine a world as beautiful as when Kofi is at the playground. They allow me to feel the promise of tomorrow, that the sun will rise regardless of how much pain is felt. But when I’m away from them and their light, the future that is promised looks a little more bleak, and I’m not sure they can do anything about it.

So what do I tell them? That it’s hopeless, that they shouldn’t dream, that they can’t change the world? No, they weren’t responsible for any of this. It’s a burden that, unfortunately, they will grow to carry, but not now, not for as long as I can possibly keep it from them. I’ll tell them to dream. I’ll tell them to hope, that it is, in fact, infinite. I’ll tell them tomorrow is beautiful. I’ll tell them they can change the world, even if I don’t believe it.