The stars don’t shine for you.

They don’t shine for anyone.

Sometimes things happen. When these things happen, you either brush it aside as happenstance, or you look for a deeper meaning into the circumstances that catalysed its occurrence. You might even consider the possibility that the universe is trying to tell you something.

Newsflash : it isn’t.

The universe, to put it politely, does not give a shuddering fuck about you. It moves on, and continues to exist, with nary a care nor acknowledgement of your cosmologically insignificant footprint on the fabric of the spacetime continuum. You don’t matter in the grand scheme of things.

There is no plan. There is no predestination. There is no such thing as fate. It’s all random chaos; entropy and disorder are so prevalent in nature that to ascribe anything other than chance to Gaia’s grand designs is to be arrogant enough to suggest that we understand the cosmos better than it already knows itself.

But wait, you say – what of the laws of motion? Thermodynamics? Gravity? Are these not rules that govern the universe, giving it order and direction? Do they not give the universe purpose?

Follow all of these rules, and you’ll still end up at a universe that will either grind itself into nothingness and a sea of dead photons, or rip itself apart as the forces of dark matter and dark energy tear reality apart on a molecular level.

It is, in a nutshell, liberating.

Insofar as an ant can understand its place in the scheme of things and find purpose that way, so can we. None of us need anything other than our own drive and determination to find the path to a life well-lived. Nor do we need the hand of destiny to guide our decisions – your choices are truly your own to make. Because ultimately, the universe will not care. Galaxies will still turn. Black holes will still suck up matter. Planets and stars will form in nebulae. Supernovas will destroy entire solar systems.

All of this will end. You, will end. So where does that leave us?

Free. Free to chart our own path, relieved of the burden of thinking that purpose has been ascribed to us, or that the silent hand of providence shall reveal some notion of a project that we are pre-ordained to become a part of. The buck starts, and stops, with you.

Love who you want to love. Care about whom you want to care about. Live your life the way you want to.

Get married. Have kids. Adopt a pet. Travel the world. Experiment. Think. Roll down a hill. Climb a mountain. Heck, maybe get a job and find a way to make yourself happy. It’s all up to you.

Just don’t make the mistake of thinking that the cosmos had anything to do with it.