Camus had a simple observation: we want life to make sense, but it doesn’t.
We keep asking “why” about everything. Why do bad things happen to good people? Why are we here? What’s the point?
The universe doesn’t answer. It just sits there, indifferent.
This mismatch — between our need for meaning and the world’s silence — is what Camus called the absurd. We’re like people shouting questions into an empty room, then getting frustrated by the echo.
Most people can’t handle this. They invent meaning. God, progress, destiny, karma. Anything to fill the silence.
Camus thought this was cheating.
His alternative: accept the absurd. Stop demanding that life make sense. Live anyway.
He used Sisyphus as his example. Sisyphus pushes a boulder up a mountain for eternity. The boulder rolls back down. He starts again. Forever.
This sounds horrible until you realize Sisyphus gets to choose his response. He can rage against the meaninglessness. Or he can find satisfaction in the pushing itself. The strength in his arms. The rhythm of the work.
Camus imagines him happy.
I think about this when nothing seems to matter. When the news is awful and my problems feel pointless and everyone’s running around pretending their busy work means something cosmic.
Maybe it doesn’t. Maybe that’s fine.
Maybe the boulder is enough.