Life often feels like an endless search for meaning. Sometimes, it appears empty and cold, making us question everything. Nihilism speaks to those dark moments, offering a raw look at existence.
In this article, we share some of the best quotes on nihilism. These words can resonate with anyone who has felt the weight of nothingness. They come from great thinkers who faced life’s void and didn’t look away.
Famous Nihilism Quotes from Literature
“God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“Life is but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more.” – William Shakespeare, Macbeth
“Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is.” – Albert Camus
“There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide.” – Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus
“Life has no meaning the moment you lose the illusion of being eternal.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“One must imagine Sisyphus happy.” – Albert Camus
“There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” – William Shakespeare, Hamlet
“I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies, but not the madness of people.” – Isaac Newton
“The world breaks everyone, and afterward, many are strong at the broken places.” – Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms
“What makes earth feel like hell is our expectation that it should feel like heaven.” – Chuck Palahniuk, Damned
“Man is nothing else but what he makes of himself.” – Jean-Paul Sartre, Existentialism is a Humanism
“To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“We are born with a yearning to return to our primal state.” – Sigmund Freud
“For as long as I could remember, I had wanted to die.” – Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
“I have no faith in human perfectibility. I think that human exertion will have no appreciable effect upon humanity.” – Edgar Allan Poe
“Hell is other people.” – Jean-Paul Sartre, No Exit
“we only regret the chances we didn’t take.” – Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
“The only way out of the labyrinth of suffering is to forgive.” – John Green, Looking for Alaska
“There is no truth. There is only perception.” – Gustave Flaubert
“Heaven and hell seem out of proportion to me: the actions of men do not deserve so much.” – Jorge Luis Borges
“We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.” – Oscar Wilde, Lady Windermere’s Fan
“In the face of absurdity, we invent reasons to live.” – Simone de Beauvoir
“Life is an illusion, a shadow, a story, and the greatest good is little enough.” – Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness
“Everything is meaningless in a world that immediately forgets you the moment you’re gone.” – Original quote
“We live in a universe where there’s no meaning, and yet we give it some through our actions.” – Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club
“The meaning of life is that it stops.” – Franz Kafka
“In the beginning, there were no reasons. Now, there’s no reason.” – Original quote
“It all fades away in time – memories, people, dreams.” – Original quote
“everything we do is a futile attempt to escape the inevitable.” – Original quote
Thought-Provoking Nihilism Quotes from Philosophers
“Life has no meaning the moment you lose the illusion of being eternal.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“The literal meaning of life is whatever you’re doing that prevents you from killing yourself.” – Albert Camus
“What is the meaning of life? Whatever you want it to be.” – Joseph Campbell
“Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is.” – Albert Camus
“We are condemned to be free.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“I know of no better life purpose than to perish in attempting the great and the impossible.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“The universe seems neither benign nor hostile, merely indifferent.” – Carl Sagan
“We live in a world where there is more and more information, and less and less meaning.” – Jean Baudrillard
“we’ll all become stories.” – Margaret Atwood
“Do not fear death so much but rather the inadequate life.” – Bertolt Brecht
“All the gods, all the heavens, all the hells, are within you.” – Joseph Campbell
“Life is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” – William Shakespeare
“One must imagine Sisyphus happy.” – Albert Camus
“The only truth is that we are all going to die.” – Haruki Murakami
“In a world where everything is meaningless, meaning itself becomes meaningless.” – John Doe (Original)
“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Nothing is everything to a nihilist.” – John Doe (Original)
“We are born alone, we live alone, we die alone. Only through our love and friendship can we create the illusion for the moment that we’re not alone.” – Orson Welles
“Every existing thing is born without reason, prolongs itself out of weakness, and dies by chance.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“Our greatest pretenses are built up not to hide the evil and the ugly in us, but our emptiness. The hardest thing to hide is something that is not there.” – Eric Hoffer
“The meaning of life is that it stops.” – Franz Kafka
“We are just an advanced breed of monkeys on a minor planet of a very average star. But we can understand the universe. That makes us something very special.” – Stephen Hawking
“Enlightenment is man’s emergence from his self-imposed immaturity.” – Immanuel Kant
“Existence precedes and rules essence.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“Today I will do what others won’t, so tomorrow I can accomplish what others can’t.” – Jerry Rice
“We are the ones who create the void, not the void the ones who create us.” – John Doe (Original)
“Hope in reality is the worst of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“There are no facts, only interpretations.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
Intriguing Nihilism Quotes from Movies
“The universe is a dark place. I’m trying to make it brighter before I die, something my ancestors failed at.” – Maximus, Gladiator
“We mustn’t succumb to the illusion that life is noble, or its end tragic.” – John Malkovich, Being John Malkovich
“We’re all pretty much alike; the difference does not lie in what we do, but in why we do it.” – Detective Somerset, Se7en
“You’re not your job. You’re not how much money you have in the bank. You’re not the car you drive. You’re not the contents of your wallet.” – Tyler Durden, Fight Club
“It’s only after we’ve lost everything that we’re free to do anything.” – Tyler Durden, Fight Club
“Have you ever transcended space and time?” – Billy, Waking Life
“We’re all part of the same compost heap.” – Tyler Durden, Fight Club
“Death is the road to awe.” – Tom Creo, The Fountain
“Life’s a burst of joy and pain and then, like yours, it’s gone.” – Ellie Arroway, Contact
“It’s a cold world out there. Sometimes I feel like I’m getting a little frosty myself.” – Lester Burnham, American Beauty
“It’s all a dream, one that will end in death and oblivion.” – Rust Cohle, True Detective
“All these moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.” – Roy Batty, Blade Runner
“The things you own end up owning you.” – Tyler Durden, Fight Club
“What’s the point of worrying in the face of the inevitable?” – Anonymous
“On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.” – Narrator, Fight Club
“Everything you do, someone out there can do it better.” – Anonymous
“What is an ocean but a multitude of drops?” – Adam Ewing, Cloud Atlas
“We are stardust, we are golden, we are billion-year-old carbon.” – Joni Mitchell
“The meaning of life is that it ends.” – Franz Kafka
“You’re alone at the center of it all, and the void is just a step away.” – Anonymous
“It’s a crazy world. Someone ought to sell tickets.” – Rust Cohle, True Detective
“Everyone ends up dead; it’s just a matter of when.” – Detective Somerset, Se7en
“There are no answers, only choices.” – Solaris
“We live in a society of an imposed reality, where materialism reigns supreme.” – Anonymous
“We’re born into a losing struggle.” – Rust Cohle, True Detective
“Life is but a fleeting whisper in the void.” – Anonymous
“Hope is the worst of evils, for it prolongs the torment of man.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“Meaninglessness does not come from being weary of pain. Meaninglessness comes from being weary of pleasure.” – G.K. Chesterton
Inspirational Nihilism Quotes for Self-Reflection
“Life has no meaning the moment you lose the illusion of being eternal.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“He who lives without folly is not as wise as he may think.” – François de La Rochefoucauld
“The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.” – Albert Camus
“When you look long into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.” – Marcus Aurelius
“All things are subject to interpretation. Whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“Once you realize that all the things you think are so important are actually meaningless, the universe starts to make a lot more sense.” – Unknown
“Life is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” – William Shakespeare
“You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.” – Albert Camus
“If we must say that life is absurd, let us also say that it is magnificent.” – Unknown
“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.” – Albert Einstein
“I don’t know what the meaning of life is, but I do know that I’m here to find out.” – Unknown
“The flower that blooms in adversity is the most rare and beautiful of all.” – Mulan
“To be is to be perceived. And so to know thyself is only possible through the eyes of the other.” – Unknown
“The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.” – Nelson Mandela
“And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“In a world where you can be anything, be kind.” – Unknown
“Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced.” – Søren Kierkegaard
“The sun rises every day whether you want it to or not. Embrace the new day, even if it feels pointless.” – Unknown
“We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.” – Oscar Wilde
“Sometimes, the only way to find meaning is to create your own.” – Unknown
“Why does the universe go to all the bother of existing? Because it doesn’t. It simply is, and we simply are.” – Stephen Hawking
“Even in the darkest places, a glimmer of light can be found.” – Unknown
“There is no truth. There is only perception.” – Gustave Flaubert
“Existence precedes and rules essence.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“Sometimes the road less traveled is less traveled for a reason.” – Jerry Seinfeld
“Life isn’t about finding yourself; it’s about creating yourself.” – George Bernard Shaw
“We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to accept the one that is waiting for us.” – Joseph Campbell
“The meaning of life is just to be alive. It is so plain and so obvious and so simple.” – Alan Watts
Contemplative Nihilism Quotes from Celebrities
“The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.” – Albert Camus
“Life is meaningless, but worth living, provided you recognize it’s meaningless.” – Alan Watts
“I don’t know what’s worse: to find something or to find nothing.” – Chuck Palahniuk
“We are born without purpose, we live without meaning, and we die without significance.” – Ridley Scott’s “Blade Runner”
“Life has no meaning the moment you lose the illusion of being eternal.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“The more the universe seems comprehensible, the more it also seems pointless.” – Steven Weinberg
“It is not uncommon for people to spend their whole life waiting to start living.” – Eckhart Tolle
“Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is.” – Albert Camus
“There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide.” – Albert Camus
“we’ll all become stories.” – Margaret Atwood
“Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.” – Marcus Aurelius
“Those who believe in nothing are very, very jealous and angry at those who believe in something.” – Dennis Prager
“You will become way less concerned with what other people think of you when you realize how seldom they do.” – David Foster Wallace
“The universe is indifferent. Who created it? Why are we here? They cannot be answered and the questions themselves are meaningless.” – Werner Herzog
“The existential vacuum manifests itself mainly in a state of boredom.” – Viktor E. Frankl
“When you look long into an abyss, the abyss looks into you.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“Existence is random. Has no pattern save what we imagine after staring at it for too long.” – Alan Moore
“Our life is a faint tracing on the surface of mystery, like the idle curved tunnels of leaf miners on the face of a leaf.” – Annie Dillard
“To be or not to be, that is the question.” – William Shakespeare
“All that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream.” – Edgar Allan Poe
“We live in a rainbow of chaos.” – Paul Cezanne
“Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.” – Philip K. Dick
“Life is but a meaningless chase for dreams that will never come true.” – Jay Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby”
“The gods had condemned Sisyphus to ceaselessly rolling a rock to the top of a mountain, whence the stone would fall back of its own weight.” – Albert Camus
“The only meaning of life is the one you create.” – Nietzsche
“People are just as happy as they make up their minds to be.” – Abraham Lincoln
“We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us.” – Charles Bukowski
“there is only dust and ashes.” – Anonymous
“Each day, in itself, brings with it an eternity.” – Paulo Coelho
Powerful Nihilism Quotes About Life
“Life is meaningless, but that doesn’t mean we should not live it to the fullest.” – Anonymous
“There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide.” – Albert Camus
“everything is a gag.” – Charlie Chaplin
“All human actions are equivalent and all are on principle doomed to failure.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“We are condemned to be free.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“Every existing thing is born without reason, prolongs itself out of weakness, and dies by chance.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is.” – Albert Camus
“The literal meaning of life is whatever you’re doing that prevents you from killing yourself.” – Albert Camus
“Life has no meaning, the moment you lose the illusion of being eternal.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“The very meaninglessness of life forces man to create his own meaning.” – Stanley Kubrick
“The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.” – Albert Camus
“Existence is a party. You join after it’s started and you leave before it’s finished.” – Elsa Maxwell
“It is not man’s dreams that fail him. It is the lack of know-how required to bring those dreams into actuality.” – L. Ron Hubbard
“We are born into a world of illusions. The wisest of us rise above them.” – Anonymous
“When the sun has set, no candle can replace it.” – George R.R. Martin
“Everybody has their own private world they create, and since all of it is meaningless, everyone’s world is right.” – Tony Robbins
“Sometimes the only way to stay sane is to go a little crazy.” – Susanna Kaysen
“The assumption that life should have meaning is where most people encounter their first philosophical dilemma.” – Anonymous
“In a universe that is suddenly and inexplicably bereft of meaning, the freedom of human beings becomes terrifying.” – David Eagleman
“We derive meaning when we lose illusions and face reality.” – Anonymous
“A life devoid of purpose is a life not worth living. Yet, purpose itself is but an illusion.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“To believe in something without reason is to live in a self-created prison.” – Anonymous
“The beauty of life is that it is pointless; once we accept that, we can truly begin to live.” – Anonymous
“There is no meaning to life except the meaning man gives his life by unfolding of his powers.” – Erich Fromm
“Our every action is neither noticed nor remembered, and yet we persist.” – Franz Kafka
“One must imagine Sisyphus happy.” – Albert Camus
“Why should I be bound to the rules of the world when the world itself is not bound by any rules?” – Anonymous
“The dread of death follows from the dread of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.” – Mark Twain
Understanding Nihilism Through Quotes
“Life has no meaning the moment you lose the illusion of being eternal.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is.” – Albert Camus
“There is something infantile in the presumption that somebody else has a responsibility to give your life meaning and point.” – Richard Dawkins
“To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“Every choice we make depletes our strength for making future choices.” – David Eagleman
“I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance.” – Socrates
“What is called liberation by one person is called destruction by another.” – Anaïs Nin
“It is not a lack of love but a lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“everything is a gag.” – Charlie Chaplin
“We are condemned to be free.” – Jean-Paul Sartre
“He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” – Henry David Thoreau
“Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.” – Alexander Pope
“Life is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” – William Shakespeare
“Truth has no special time of its own. Its hour is now – always.” – Albert Schweitzer
“Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.” – Ernest Hemingway
“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.” – Albert Camus
“The unexamined life is not worth living.” – Socrates
“The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.” – Martin Luther King Jr.
“All that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream.” – Edgar Allan Poe
“When you look into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“I rebel, therefore I exist.” – Albert Camus
“Beyond good and evil lies the realm of the absolute.” – Original
“Chaos is rejecting all you have learned, chaos is being yourself.” – Emil Cioran
“The soul which has no fixed purpose in life is lost; to be everywhere, is to be nowhere.” – Michel de Montaigne
“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.” – Kurt Vonnegut
“The eternal silence of these infinite spaces frightens me.” – Blaise Pascal
“Beneath the surface of every human being lies the tangle of contradictions that is the essence of life.” – Original
“It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.” – Marcus Aurelius
Last Words
Nihilism can be a heavy subject, but quotes from great thinkers can offer a meaningful perspective on this philosophy. These quotes may help us understand the depth of human thought and the complexities of life. By reflecting on these words, we can find our own ways to navigate through life’s uncertainties.
Whether you agree with the ideas or not, nihilism challenges us to think differently about existence and meaning. It’s important to engage with different viewpoints to expand our understanding. So, take some time to ponder over these quotes. They might just change how you see the world.
