Danilo Tanic

Berlin, Germany

May 26 2025

After years of resisting meaninglessness, one reaches a paradox: work becomes both the justification for existence and the proof of its worthlessness. The search for a mask to wear—some role or identity to conceal the void—becomes urgent. Yet to an intelligent man, every mask seems exhausted, ill-fitting, or false. And behind this collapse of options lies the certainty that returning to institutional “cures” offers nothing but a slower death.


The Grosse Fuge can loop endlessly in the mind as a grinding accompaniment to suicidal thought. Pain ceases to rise and fall; it flattens into a drowsy confusion that strips away both terror and comfort. The question persists: how does one remain, and for what purpose?


Existence under these conditions feels like drowning after the wave has already broken. There is still air in the lungs, but only enough to sustain the spin of survival. Sensation dulls until both body and mind drift toward numbness. Life continues, though it feels like moving through the world as a ghost of what was once the self.


It seems like everyone’s ultimate goal on this earth is to cheat death, yet our only job is to die.

Danilo Tanic