I came across this video a couple weeks ago and have been kinda stuck on it. I love it so much.

A bunch of ideas were landing in my head around this time. Like, what it is I want to do with this newsletter you’re reading. I was intending to share my philosophy on things that are important to me. But I’m not sure what my philosophy is, really. So I want to share my philosophy but don’t quite know what it is. That’s kind of absurd, no?

And then there’s the Backfire Effect I am seeing everywhere...

The backfire effect is a cognitive bias that causes people who encounter evidence that challenges their beliefs to reject that evidence, and to strengthen their support of their original stance.

I highly recommend reading The Oatmeal’s take on this, it’s fantastic as usual.

So that rejection of evidence and digging in of the heels is really absurd, right?

Yesterday I was in a meditation class with a room full of strangers. The instructor had us focusing on counting to ten, one count for each breath, to help us settle into the practice. Counting helps you focus on being aware of your thoughts. Being separate from them. Anyway when I got to ten, I thought how funny would it be if I jumped up and screamed “I crushed it!”. Like full on Bro style.

I chuckled to myself. I started writing a sketch in my head. Two Bros interrupting an otherwise mild mannered meditation session. Slamming Monster Energy Drinks, high-fiving, being loud. I couldn’t stop myself for thinking about this. But I was aware that I was aware of all this. That’s absurd too. The more I understand meditation the less I know. Maybe that’s the whole point.

I’ve got this short film idea I’m calling “Fucking Turmeric” at the moment. It is indeed centered around someone being really angry at the spice Turmeric. Being angry at a spice is absurd in it’s own right. But this idea is nothing more than a bunch of gags. There’s no real motivation or substance for the protagonists anger.

After watching that video, I thought of the protagonist moving through different philosophies could be funny and have some meaning as well.

As far as I can tell, if there is no intrinsic meaning to life (or we can’t know it):

• Existentialists make their own meaning as they feel they can do so via free will.

• Hedonists make meaning solely based on pleasure as they feel they should enjoy it all while they’re here.

• Nihilists do not make their own meaning, as they feel it’s pointless to do so.

• Absurdists accept and revolt against a lack of meaning by focusing on the things in front of and around them.

I’m a little hazy on the definition of Absurdism, but I’m thinking of using that as the protagonists resolution. They’ll move though the other philosophies with dire consequences, until just accepting the absurdity of the fact that we can never know the meaning of it all, but we have a unquenchable thirst to learn the meaning of it all.

That is absurd.

I’ll most likely never be able to write and perform comedy on stage or screen and make a living, at least a living as I have now. But that’s really what I want to do. But maybe not, because once it’s a “job”, will it still be fun? So I embrace the fact that I’ll never know and I ask this of myself all the time.

So I’ll embrace all that, and just go try and write something funny.