Dealing with loss

[Coffee Jesus]

It brings to mind a feeling and a thought that I've had from time to time in my life. That our existence in and of itself is rather pointless. At least for all I am aware.

We can provide eachother with purpose as well as any god could. The only difference is finite vs infinite, but something finite can still be enough.

The secular world seems to want to either run from the problem or hide it away. We are born, we exist for a short time, and then we die. All that we thought we were is erased, except the atoms that made up our bodies. Knowing the scientific principles behind this stark reality gives me no confort at all.

You've got it backwards. Religion provides "emotion-focused coping" rather than "problem-focused coping". In fact, religion tells you there wasn't even a problem to begin with, which is why it's useless.

Death is a problem we can solve.

Evolution, genetics, and so on. Fine -- I know about all that. But take an emotion like love hurt, for example. There is probably some evolutionary answer to why we have this emotion. I would guess, its because we're reminded not to give up on the person we've found suitable for mating. But why does this feeling persist long after all hope is lost, driving people too all kinds of antisocial and self-destructive behavior?
I'll tell you what I think. Its like the appendix. A useless vestige that will breed away in a few thousand generations, perhaps. But its not going to happen any time during our lives. Wonderful and complex sad shit, is what it is.

We experience stress because it can be useful.