Reflection IV: A New Reflection 

09/21/2019 

Every day, we wake up. Every day, we go to school or work. Every day, we live a day 

that we will most likely forget. Why do we live days that appear to be nothing more than 

expendable? Why are we content with living such mundane lives? 

Albert Camus, famous absurdist, gave his take on all this in the writing “The Myth 

of Sisyphus.” Sisyphus is a famous Greek mythological figure who is famous for his 

punishment; having to push a rock up the hill, only for it to fall down again. People 

have always saw this story and looked no further than the fact it is about an evil man 

who is subject to one of the worst punishments in history. This is not the case of Camus. 

He believes that Sisyphus actually enjoys his “punishment,” and even puts his best effort 

into being the greatest rock-pusher-up-hill-person of all time. Sisyphus believed 

getting this rock up the hill was his sole purpose in life, his calling. So day in and day 
out he worked tirelessly to get this sphere up the hill, even though he knew he would have 

to do it again the next day. Are we not all like Sysphus? There are a lot of people who 

perform these mundane tasks thinking that it gives their life meaning. I guarantee 

most of said people don’t even realize that their task is mundane, I mean, why would you 

put so much effort into doing something banal? While I personally like to believe that 

the story should be a lesson on working hard and being the best at everything you do, 

that was not the intention of the author. He believed that it is absurd that humans seek to 

find meaning in life, as he believes there is none. This absurd path that us as humans 

follow will always lead to a dead end. The only way to truly find purpose is to give 

ourselves an illusion of purpose. We have to create our own meaning in life, and some 

people find this meaning while they are pushing a rock up a hill. 

A man and a “judge-penitent” walk into a bar in Amsterdam. This may appear to 

but a set up for a joke, but rather it is the setting for an existentialism book. We, the 

reader, are in the point-of-view of an unidentified bar patreon who stumbles across a 
former lawyer. Throughout the course of the novel, we listen to this man’s story. This 

man talks about how he performs unselfish acts for selfish reasons. He loves to stroke his 

ego by helping those in need, usually in public, to showcase how “good” of a person he is. 

He realizes how much of a hypocrite he is when he encounters a woman drowning, and 

does nothing; he doesn’t want to risk losing his life for someone else. I found myself 

constantly judging the character, but once I sat back and thought about it, I am not one 

to judge. I have, at times, done nice things in the hope that people will look at me as a 

good person, which was my motive for doing said nice task. That is exactly what Camus 

wanted to instill in our minds. We are selfish creatures. Even when we appear to be 

doing something unselfish, there is always an ulterior motive. ​Mankind is selfish in 

nature​.