The Desire to Disappear

Have you ever felt the desire to simply stop existing—not to die, but to dissolve, to never have been at all? This isn't suicidal ideation. It's something stranger and more paradoxical: the longing to escape the burden of being someone.

In this video essay, we explore what philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer called "the tyranny of the Will"—the blind force that drives all existence into perpetual wanting, striving, and suffering. Through Schopenhauer's philosophy, Buddhist concepts of dukkha and anatta, and Kierkegaard's "sickness unto death," we examine why consciousness itself can feel like a prison, why individuation creates unbearable isolation, and why the desire to disappear is actually a form of profound clarity.
We'll look at the small deaths we practice daily—dissociation, numbing, scrolling into oblivion—and why they're all manifestations of the same impossible desire. This is a philosophical exploration of what it means to be exhausted by existence itself, and what Schopenhauer understood about living with that weight.

If you've ever wanted to vanish without violence, to slip between the cracks of being, this video is for you.

#philosophy #schopenhauer #existentialism #mentalhealth #consciousness #buddhism #kierkegaard #videoessay #philosophicalthinking