I try to be positive [in a world with so much disappointment].
Your dog dies and you cry;
thousands of children are killed and/or mutilated in adults’ wars and you cry nothing.
An Indian farmer has his crop destroyed by hail and he cannot pay the bank the loan;
he kills himself leaving 4 children behind.
The bank manager cries nothing.
Life is a disappointment, if not a disaster.

Woe is you. Oh, woe. Oh, woe.

There are meds for that, you know. They are effective.

IT HAPPENS AND IT SUCKS, but what would you have me do? I am not going to kill myself or give up JUST because bad things happen.

In the evolution of carbon based life, much less the human species, IT IS A DISASTER. Most attempts at life FAIL! The majority of acorns that fall of a tree ROT! For every sperm that gets to the egg there are millions more PER LOAD that die! Multiply that by all the attempts of all the men in our species history and that would equal hundreds of trillions of attempts at life that FAIL!

What do you want? You want say you are special? To what, to who? Not life, not our evolution. YOU SHOULD BE SPECIAL TO YOURSELF. I don't think you have to be depressed about being part of a harsh reality. Nor do you have to dwell on it to survive.

I am not special. My death would not hault any tomorrow but my own. But the same thing that drives me is the same reason trees continue to germinate and grow from acorns. I am lucky enough to be part of life and just because bad happens doesn't deter me from valuing my luck. My luck might run out just like the farmer, but I am not him nor does life cease to continue when bad things happen. EVENTUALLY all life will die when our planet dies. But I think it is reasonable to want to continue even in the face of this harsh reality.

If you are depressed about the state of the world, THAT IS NORMAL, but if that is the case, get help. Maybe if this guy you speak of had enough family support and emotional support he may not have done what he did. You certainly don't have to let any depression you might have lead to that same result.

I have suffered from depression myself. But it always seems that the more days I stick around I find that any gloom I might have is NOT forever, and something else eventually comes along that cheers me up.

Eh, life is great from my view, nice house, good friends, great family, beautiful daughter, sure shit happens, but in my life time I have made sure that the happier times out weight the sad times, with the exception of deaths, which I cannot control (gotta accept that fact, not just merely know about it). But sure life sucks for some people, but even the poor have happy times, it's really a matter of perception. 

 Julio, you have a habit of assuming premises and perspectives.  That is, many of your questions have an unspoken assumption that perhaps seems obvious to you, but in reality, is not demonstrated.  This makes many of your questions impossible to answer.  If I had to make a guess, I'd say that you're suffering from human-centricity.  In other words, you think of things in anthropomorphic terms and from human perspectives, without taking into account that these perspectives are only meaningful within their own context.

Anyway:

Julio, I'd strongly suggest that you do some in-depth reading about natural selection, and think about what that implies for humans.  

*  War is intraspecies competition.  Competition is one of the primary forces in natural selection.  It is not unique to humans.  We see it in most other colonial and pack animals.  It's simply the "Selfish Gene" expressing itself by attempting to protect "My Tribe" by preventing "Your Tribe" from either killing us or taking our resources or females.  Where there is natural selection, there will be war.

* Disease is other species trying to survive.  (At least where pathogens are the cause.)  From the perspective of a non-human, humans have committed genocide thousands of times, since we've pretty much wiped out thousands of strains of bacteria since the invention of penicillin.  Bacteria are life forms, and like all other life forms, they must take from others to live.   Where genetic diversity is the cause, that's just an effect of natural selection.  Diversity is the key to survival, but diversity also ensures that there will be some losers in the DNA lottery.

* Overpopulation is a result of natural selection.  Please read this article in its entirety to understand the mechanisms behind it:  Conspicuous Consumption

* Famine is a result of both environmental change and overconsumption.

* "Premature death" is kind of nonsense.  You're relying on your own expectations for other people and yourself, which are entirely arbitrary.  By comparison to the past, almost all humans live well beyond their "average lifespan," and the vast majority live long enough to have children (whether they succeed or not).  So from the point of view of natural selection, there's no significant problem with premature death.  It's only a pain in the ass to us humans because we get attached to our own lives and those of others, and selfishly want them to continue.

* Yes.  Life is really to be this way.  There is no other possibility.  

As usual, you've ended with a question that includes a hidden assumption.  Life isn't worth anything if nobody's buying it.  I can't answer your question unless you give me more information.

Here's another article for you to read concerning value and meaning in life:

For New Atheists: Is This Really All There Is?

Now now!  Let's be a little less aggressive here, shall we? 

I'm pretty sure the worst thing to tell somebody who's depressed is that "well yeah, life sucks GET OVER IT". 

Do see a counsellor, though, julio.  You may or may not need medication but when you're that far down you need professional help.  I know because I've been there and I'm pretty confident that at least a few of the other posters here know it just as well.

Life is not a disappointment, not at all. The law of action and reaction works. Life is what we make it. If we do bad things, life is bad, and if we do good things, life is good. That is 100% true, if you see humanity as one species, indivisibly bonded with environment, over historical periods. There is relatively few of disasters,  that wouldn't be caused by human activity.  The world behaves exactly as expected.
But there is a greater truth. Just as we can screw the world up, so we can make it good and create a golden age of civilization. There were ancient civilizations, that lasted continually for thousands of years! It's actually quite simple and well within our possibilities. We have the resources, technology, theoretic basis, willing public and a deadline ahead of us. The only thing remaining is a political (and commercial) will. This is, activism on all levels, from lowest to highest.

Let me ask you one small question. Do you want life to be good? Do you want to be happy? Do you want to solve your problems? it seems you forgot to be specific about it. Because, if you enjoy your depression, if you don't want to get rid of it, if you like to complain, then you have no problem that can be helped. My dad tells such a people, "go to your doctor, go to your psychologist, go to your lawyer."

Hi, Brian37.
Of course I agree with you.
Yet, you have but illustrated what is my objective impression of life.
Life is a disappointment.
There is no equality in matters of happiness.
You might be happy in your dejection, but that serves to illustrate my observation that life is a disappointment.
Life could be better, and should be better, and would be better under different conditions.
That’s my observation.
You are entitled to yours.
It doesn’t depend on me to restructure life, but if it were in my hands, I would find a better balance, more equity and more happiness.
No child would be raped, or filmed being raped to post it on the Internet.
Nobody would go unemployed and have a family living in poverty.
No mother would die giving birth.
Things like that.

Well, life is "worth" whatever price you put on it.  Your life is yours to live and make what you want of it.

And to touch on humanity being a disappointment, that's what it was from the moment we became smarter than every other animal.  We're told from the day we're born that humanity is this beautiful, special thing.  But it's all bullshit.  That's just what we want to believe because we humans generally are egocentric and think it's all about us.  But it's not.  It's not about anything, least of all US.

Of course all those things happen.

But there are positive moments, or can be, for all but those in the most dire of circumstances.

To completely ignore any moment of joy or pleasure, just because it doesn't last forever, just because bad things also happen, and may outweigh the good, in your judgement, is really going way overboard in obsessing over the negatives.

A word of appreciation from a friend or colleague that you have helped in some way can make all the difference to a day, if you let it, and don't let the gloomy outlook for humanity as  a whole consume your life.

everyone is getting so worked up, either aggressively or sympathetically.  am i the only one who has a hard time taking julio seriously because i think he tries to fire up debates on purpose?

i think his overall posting behavior supports my hypothesis: he's probably one of the people on here who starts the most new threads, usually beginning with some extreme position stated in a blunt way; he doggedly sticks to that position once everybody rushes at him, though seldom changes his phrasing or offers any new evidence (sometimes he offers no evidence to begin with); he often ends his posts, especially his OPs, with open-ended questions.

i believe will once called such people "shit-disturbers."

what do you think?

(see how i did that?)

Ok, you act like I get joy torturing you with the plight of my beloved (all be it sucky Redskins) week after week. You act as if life is Candy Land. I don't need friends like you. (Note to self: Did I think that, or type it?)

Value is not found in utopias. Value is not magical. Value is what we make for ourselves. The ride will end, but that does not mean we have to default to doom and gloom in the face of reality.

I agree "Karma" is a superstition. REALITY is that good people do bad things and bad people do good things and our existence is not dependent on good luck beating bad luck. Our existence is luck and any good we can make out of that is a plus, not a given.

Or, he could join a religion! It produces a similar effect, lol.

Bloody hell, where have I been?

We also get earthquakes, volcano eruptions and terrorist attacks; I personally favor volcanoes.

Y'see? Hope!

Indeed we do! Go get 'em sport.

Since when did flies learn to speak?

If you think of it that way... I'm going to kill myself now

You sir need to get laid.

 I'm sorry that you are on hard times and I hope you feel better.

I think it is best for all of us to be mindful of the science behind our existence and correlating that with the future of our offspring.  The future is uncertain, our race may even be extinct one day, but life in the grand scheme of things will go on!  Think about it: the universe is the creator of life and it is anti-intellectual and illogical to think we are the only life that will ever exist.

Where does this life come from?  Evolution of the universe.  (Please be mindful of the meaning of the word evolution instead of the theory of the evolution of our species from other life.)  

Matter, which is perceived to be absolutely void of consciousness, gave birth to consciousness.  Consciousness, which in a sense seems to be void of the greatness of our species, gave birth to the beauty that we can currently be.  Even if all of us die, there is the certainty in the numbers that a species like ours will develop in the universe again, flourish, and make another yet another jump reality that are just like the ones I described.

This is something I've been thinking of lately really: "What is the full potential of the fact that evolution is a central theme to the universe?"  Could it be an evolution of our biological makeup?  Could it be our intellect inventing something like a wonderous artificial intelligence?  Not only is the potential future something unimaginably magnificent to us:  it is a part of the makeup of the reality of the universe.

It's just like the (usually circular) argument that persists in our human thought: "Nobody can truly disprove either God or persisting consciousness after we die."  Take that into mind, but also notion that there are possibilities we do not perceive as of yet.  I can't disprove that we will live on forever, but I can think of rational possibilities for either that being true or untrue. The ones that atheists and agnostics usually center on is that it is not true, and (western) theists the opposite.  But think about it: life can go on through science.  Examples I think of that are the most possible in my mind center around invention rather than biological evolution.  

Example: One day we may be able to invent a machine that stores our entirety of consciousness and/or artificial intelligence we create can live on forever.  To take it in a different direction, perhaps something one day this will be coupled with the invention of a hyperdrive that enables possibilities like time travel or the ability to see through time.  Combine both and you have the possibility that they could be combined and all the intellectual being that will ever exist could be preserved through something like recreation.  (Feel free to argue my logic and science, in fact please do it if you can.)

It's rather odd and against our primal nature to think of such things and still be centered in non delusion.  But if you think about it, the evolution of existence has already given us (a makeup of the universe) the ability to have its feet on the ground and its head in the sky.  In the end, it's just considering the numbers and the grand scheme of things.

Sorry for the ramble and I should have organized my thoughts better but I think everyone can get the gist of what I've said.

disappointment in what sense? how so? compared to what? Life is great, there are moments of sadness and moments that suck ass, but reality it's how your perceive it all, so disappointment in what sense? because from where I am, it's great, I am enjoying every moment of every day, even the crappy days I am still doing phenomenal. Why because I am still alive, I am still doing things, even when friends or family die I still get to live my life how I wish to. This disappointment is according to what standard?

Huh?

"The ride" in Brian's post is a metaphor for life. Do you mean that it is disappointing that there will be an end to the ride?

Seriously, living with cancer, aids, as a slave, starving, blind, etc is fine. You are still alive. You only get one life, what you make out of it is yours. 

It's not like any other animal expects more than that. What do you want?

A lot of people have hard blows in life and are fine. Often they are better for it, in my opinion.

You have to appreciate what you have not what you don't. Greener pastures aren't the way to live unless you are building a bridge across to them.

I don't know what you want from us here. You have said what you have to say. We have explained to you that you do not have to focus on the bad all the time. We are not professional councilors.

You say, "Life is a dissapointment"

We say, "It can be, but not always. Life is harsh, but so what".

Now what? If this is bothering you that much all we can do is urge you to seek out professional help. I don't know what else to tell you other than get help if it is bothering you that much.

That balloon video was disturbing at first, then hilarious.

Thank you, ClockCat.  Thank you.