Existentialism is the belief that every individual is only a limited human being. Thus, every person must face important and difficult decisions with only limited knowledge and time in which to make these decisions. Existentialists see human life as being basically a series of decisions that must be made with no way of knowing what the correct choices are. The individual must decide what is true and what is false; what is right and what is wrong; which beliefs to accept and which to reject; what to do and what not to do. The individual has to decide which societal standards to accept and which ones to reject. Existentialism is a way of thinking that takes a negative view of human life saying that life is meaningless and absurd.Although I have always been told in my years of Catholic education that the purpose of human life is to love one another, serve God, and carry out His plan for us as individuals, I can see some merit in the principles of Existentialism. When looking at human life from a non-religious point of view, humans are born, live a while, and die. We have no real reason to live; no higher purpose or any real mission to accomplish. Philosophers have always tried to answer the question “what is the meaning of life?” Existentialists would answer “there is no meaning of life; humans were put on earth to live for a couple years, then die.” To some degree, I agree with this statement. My life won’t make a bit of difference in the grand scheme of things. I also agree with another belief of existentialism that humans must make decisions without having any way of knowing what the correct choice is in any situation. We learn through the mistakes we make and that helps to shape who we are....
