Is life worth living?

By Lukas Schwekendiek, Life Coach, Speaker, Writer. Published on TIME, INC & Huffington Post. I’ve asked myself that question over and over again and, for me, I came to the following conclusion: Does it really matter? I mean, whether or not life is worth living, we are still alive right now, aren’t we? And who knows what happens after that… So. Even if life wasn’t worth living, then I believe it is our duty to make it worth living! I mean, what’s the other option? There is no problem if you feel life is worth living, but there is when you feel it isn’t worth living, but what will you do instead? Kill yourself and hope for the best? Trust your beliefs to the point that you would risk it all on one card? Or would you try to live, try to make life worth living any way you know how? You can always die later, always find out if it actually was worth it or not when your life will end, but at that point, if you were wrong you’re done. All things considered, that risk is way too great for me to go for. The risk is that either I end my life and hope for the best, I live my life the best way I know how and try to squeeze every ounce of worth out of it, or I just do nothing and wait for death. Option 3 is by far the worst, but option 1 is just a quicker way to get to the same result, whereas option 1 has the potential to be freaking amazing, to be something no one has ever experienced before and to be filled with all kinds of things. Life may not be worth living right from the start. But besides waiting for death or getting to it quicker, all you can do is make the best of it right now. You have the same options, what will you choose? 30k views · View Upvoters · View Sharers · Answer requested by Jennifer Gurney Frank Diamond Koo Seth Sommers Jun 5, 2016 Your answer really helped me. No poeticism, no mild chastisement, no hollow attempt at evangelizing the joys of life, just a reminder that life is an evolving what-if scenario while death is just the end of that. Lukas Schwekendiek, Original Author · Jun 5, 2016 I think the quote “Life is what you make it” fits best. If you chose to be tired, upset and have a boring life, by all means, go for it, if that is what you really want out of it, but I am sure as hell not going to do that. I will make my life worth living :) That’s just my take on it :) David Morley I have had my moment especially when I came to the point I could no longer work, to some that sound like a dream but for me, it was a nightmare, I loved what I did and it also made me feel young, kept my brain working and I had living wage of £2000 a month more if I sold more images. I now live on less than £400 a month, people who I thought were friends stop calling, stop visiting. I sat alone with day time tv, worrying about how I would pay bills, treat my grandchildren. I gathered together a selection of painkillers, I even researched how painful it would be to die. Then something happened in the strangest way I got a rude letter which came through my door from my credit card company who has been told that I had no money to pay them and this letter demanded money if not they will employ a collection agency to visit me. I was so angry that I thought ‘fuck them if they want a fight I will fight them. I made an offer that I could afford and they said they want more, I suddenly found a focus for the anger I had for not being able to walk and directed it now to the collections agency. I answered their phone calls and repeated my offer, I printed and posted replies to their letter. I offered the same amount I wrote and they called. I fought. After 9 months they accepted my offer. Because of that I got rid of all my anger and frustration and found my zest for life.