I seem to be suffering from writer’s block. I want to write scripts, articles, essays, and my college essays (mainly this) on engaging, thought-provoking, genuinely original content about my worldviews or whatever random thought comes to mind. I’ve been struck with the realization, however, that any take of mine has probably been taken by someone else. So I am writing about whether or not anything is actually original anymore.

Each and every single one of us is unique from a scientific standpoint, unless maybe you’re a clone, so logically it’d be safe to assume that the ideas we have are original. In my mind, however, now more than ever, (that rhymes) that seems unlikely. Think about the billions of people that have lived on this planet, think about the hundreds of thousands of years that our species have existed, it’s rather impossible to believe that anything you or I come up with is truly a thought that has never been thought before. It’s likely that our viewpoints have been mulled over at least once before. 

However, I do think the way in which we form philosophies and express them could be “original”. Even those with similar thought processes come to conclusions differently. The exigence (thanks AP Lang) of ideas come from other observations that have been around for eons. And perspectives, no matter how they are deduced, most likely were concluded in a way that someone else has. Maybe ideas can be original based on context. I could say something in school to my friends, family, etc. that would be considered “original”. I could make an argument that isn’t particularly popular or often heard that might be considered a “hot take.”  In any situation, I’m probably repeating a concept that has been versed by someone before me, way before my time, so at the time I say it, it becomes something that someone hasn’t been brought to light in a while. The infinite number of thoughts we have had definitely haven’t been communicated to everybody to have ever existed, so in a way, that’s original. 

Simply, I can write/think/talk about anything that I find deeply interesting, and the way I write/think/talk about them could be “original,” but I’ll sadly go off the assumption that either the thing I’m talking about or the conclusions I make have probably been said. Maybe this is something that one of you has never considered. Honestly, this article isn’t even original, and how could it be? People everywhere, and especially on Reddit (which I found out in literally 30 seconds of research for my article) are always asking this question.

Hopefully, this article will help me cope with my lack of originality and not feel like everything (ideas-wise) that I write is terrible.