The Anxiety of Dasein

Dasein has a past and a possible future time. Its future is not guaranteed. It is out of control, however every little action of Dasein will have a big impact on its future. We see the paradox of choices. We are terrible at making choices among the available options. Dasein is a finite entity and is faced with endless choices for its future. Dasein is constantly under pressure with the existence of time. Time kills Dasein in many ways. It brings anxiety. But what do we mean when we refer to the choices and the limited time. First, we have to understand the nature of time. Time comes to reality when Dasein enter the world as a baby. It’s like a stopwatch from the very first moment when Dasein is born. The stopwatch will stop somewhat somewhere in the life of Dasein. Now we can talk about the available choices for Dasein. Dasein is faced to take action during his time while he has no control over time. In fact, time always dominates Dasein in many ways. Dasein’s decisions is heavily influenced by time. Time is a key variable that will force Dasein to make choices in different circumstances. But what is the source of anxiety for Dasein? Dasein cannot stop time from its chronocity. Also, time will never stop for Dasein. Dasein put massive efforts to kill time from moving forward through different means. Alcohol, tobacco, drugs, sex, food and sleep are all different ways that a Dasein will try to hang time. In fact, we are constantly playing with time in a world that is moving with the speed of light. We rely on science and our practical experience to understand time and bring it under our control. But this is never going to happen. 

Let’s take another study into essence of time from another point of view. This is art and specifically about cinema. Cinema is the world of motion pictures just like life. It is an area where we act and play time under its domain. We spend two hours watching time that is moving forward or backward. We love watching time because something abstract now has a kind of form. We think we are now in harmony with the flow of time. Time moves as we move forward. Time is the god of the postmodern world. When we learn how to make an influence by using time wisely, we are born again and again. Maybe we can say Dasein is always trying to give birth to its existence in different forms. To summarize the impact of Cinema on time, we have to dig a deep hollow and understand the nature of art. We can say that art is born out of boredom. We use our creativity to give birth to art to stop, hold and freeze the moving time. In other words, every second of life is turned into something immortal. 

We also need to align our studies with the reality of current time. We are living in an are where instant gratification is a new trend. A new phenomena and the sick reaction we have toward time. We crazily kill the boredom of time into tiny seconds through constant excitement to distract our brain from the anxiety of time being used or lost. The dark side of this new reaction is impatience. We no longer have the patience to yield for time. Art has the solution for us but it requires patience, perseverance and persistence. But why patience is no longer sacred in the new world? Why we always rush for meaningless destinations? We are mad people of the new world where we want to become successful and being recognized quickly and furiously. This is a sad story.

Every story has a beginning and an end. No great story starts with instant excitement to grab the viewer/reader/user’s attention to kill its boredom from time. A great audience will wait and test your character based on the story you write from your life. One great artist knows how to start its story, performance and act of Dasein with enlightenment. The story will then have some moments of endless anxiety and boredom in the middle of time. That’s the time when the artist to learn how to be aware and still act and move in accordance with the end of story. 

And what is the end of story?

The death of Dasein. The immortal life of a mortal person who now can look at his past and see how time was used wisely and in accordance to his values. Dasein will leave the world with a legacy. The legacy is learning how to heal pain and bring softness to the world. The world of hardness and boredom of time. Softness is the mother of beauty. The softness of touching a beautiful woman. The softness of kissing. The softness of painting, cooking, producing a song and so on. The softness of enjoying boredom in life and control the existential anxiety of Dasein.