You ask a question. The universe does not answer.

This is not a defect in the universe, nor a failing in you. It is simply the condition in which we find ourselves. We are creatures who need meaning, explanation, purpose. We wake each morning with a hunger for reasons. Why am I here? What should I do with my life? Does any of this matter?

The world offers no response. Not cruelty, not indifference in any personal sense. Just silence. The stars continue their rotations. The seasons turn. Life goes on around us with no regard for our desperate questions.

Camus called this collision the absurd. Not the world alone, and not our longing alone, but the gap between them. The absurd exists in that space where human need meets cosmic quiet.

This is actually good news. The problem is not that you are broken or asking the wrong questions. The problem is structural. It belongs to existence itself. Once you understand this, you can stop blaming yourself for not finding the answer hidden somewhere in the universe. There is no hidden answer. There is only this confrontation, and what you choose to do with it.

Today marks the beginning of a month spent examining this confrontation. Not to despair over it, but to understand it clearly enough that we can live with it honestly.