The aphorism, "Chase everything that you desire, except love and death. They will find you when it’s time," encapsulates a profound philosophical perspective on the nature of human agency, the inevitability of existential markers, and the limits of control.
This sentiment aligns with long-standing traditions in
literature and philosophy that distinguish between things we can actively
pursue—such as ambition, knowledge, or material goals—and those that are
considered "fated" or beyond the reach of human volition.
In the context of human desire, the pursuit of
external goals is often viewed as a function of the will.
Philosophers like Arthur Schopenhauer, in his seminal work The World as
Will and Representation, argued that human life is driven by an insatiable
"will to live," which compels individuals to chase desires
constantly.
However, the wisdom embedded in your query suggests a
strategic surrender regarding love and death. Love, in this philosophical
framework, is often treated as an "event" or an encounter that
disrupts the subject, rather than a commodity to be acquired through effort.
As Roland Barthes explores in A Lover's Discourse,
love is frequently experienced as a state of being that "happens" to
the individual, often arriving with a sense of inevitability that defies
rational planning.
Death, conversely, is the ultimate boundary of the
human experience. Martin Heidegger, in Being and Time, posits that
death is the "possibility of the impossibility of any existence at
all."
Because death is the one event that is uniquely one's own
and yet entirely outside the scope of active "chasing," it remains
the definitive horizon of human life.
To "chase" death would be a paradox, as it
is the very end of the pursuit itself. By suggesting that these two forces—love
and death—will "find you," the aphorism advocates for a life
lived with active engagement in worldly pursuits, while maintaining a
receptive, humble posture toward the transformative and terminal events that
define the human condition.
This balance between agency (chasing) and passivity (being found) is a recurring theme in existentialist thought, emphasizing that while we are the authors of our daily actions, we are also the subjects of forces that transcend our individual control.
