In some remote corner of the universe,
effused into innumerable solar-systems,
there was once a star upon which clever animals
invented cognition.

It was the haughtiest, most mendacious moment
in the history of this world,
but yet only a moment.

After Nature had taken breath awhile
the star congealed
and the clever animals had to die,–
someone might write a fable after this style,
and yet he would not have illustrated sufficiently,
how wretched,; shadow-like, transitory, purposeless and fanciful
the human intellect appears in Nature.

There were eternities
during which this intellect did not exist,
and when it has once more passed away
there will be nothing to show that it has existed.
For this intellect is not concerned with any further mission
transcending the sphere of human life.

No, it is purely human
and none but its owner and procreator
regards it so pathetically as to suppose
the world revolves around it.

If, however,
we and the gnat
could understand each other
we should learn that even the gnat swims
through the air with the same pathos,
and feels within itself
the flying center of the world.

–On Truth and Falsity in their Ultramoral Sense by Friedrich Nietzsche

Today I have a circumference of pessimism. Waking I felt acentric, rested but disoriented. Low blood-sugar perhaps? I checked and that was Ok. So what could be the cause? Everything is complex so I give up the attempt to know. Patience, I tell myself. Everything finds equilibrium in due time. Things always have. So far so good.

This passage from an essay at the end of the book entitled Early Greek Philosophy and Other Essays suggests that the big picture is one of tragedy. Time is no healer. Moreover the near term tragedy: inscribed in the heart of consciousness, a mind. The emergence of mind from life’s multiform expression is a persistent self-centeredness.

I and I alone am the center of the universe.

From the human being to a more simple gnat flying about the bathroom toilet…

A delusional pretense.

And there is and can be no further mission.

WTF!  I cannot entertain such crushing thoughts for very long.  How about a song, a life-line to help us across to find firmer footing?  This one!  Shallow by Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga

Since you and I have nothing, absolutely nothing to lose – why not go ahead and dive into the deep end of the pond?