We all come in to college with our own stories, backgrounds, and reasons for attending. But in a collective sense, we all participate in a common endeavor, a shared education. It’s this ideal sense of community that unites us as students, giving us a new prism through which to understand others and ourselves. We’re alone together, making our way as individuals—on our own for the first time—in a place full of them. In order to grow, in order to step out of the shadow of our families and our hometowns, we’ve all lifted up our roots and decided to plant them in the same ground. But that just answers why are you here at Northwestern? And that’s a fine place to start, but the question communicates more than that. What if what you really want to know is why are you here in the first place? Let’s rewind.
Your existence is nothing less than a winning lottery ticket of circumstance. Common parlance refers to the “miracle of birth”, even if not everyone agrees with the implication of a divine presence at its base. At the very least, your life—the fact that you are you and no one else—was an extremely fortunate and unlikely occurrence.
And so if each of us is, in a sense, the beneficiary of a cosmic game of chance, the next question, and the one that most of us are grappling with right now, concerns what to do with the proceeds. What will you make of what you’ve been given? What is your purpose? What are you here for?
college is the time for me to figure that out
Thu 16, 2008 2:47... Read more Sun 19, 2008 11:58
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To try and make here better
Sun 19, 2008 1:19... Read more Sun 19, 2008 2:55
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In my opinion, this question has a lot to do with living in the moment versus looking long term. I feel that people who look long term are constantly struggling to find an answer. These are the individuals who believe that they have one purpose, and are desperately searching to expose it. Rather, those people who live in the moment-take life day by day, they are about the evolution of purpose. I realize that the question, “Why are we here?” is inextricably linked to purpose.
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Maybe it’s not so much “why are you here” as it is “what do you do now that you’re here”. You can’t do anything about the first question, but you can affect so much with the second.
Sun 19, 2008 6:15for my kids…
Fri 24, 2008 5:57When a visiting Emerson asked this question to Thoreau, jailed for protesting the Mexican American War by not paying his taxes, the reply was “Why are you NOT here?” We are here to make a stand, to say something, to matter.
Tue 18, 2008 1:54