Surely, there is meaning just in being there. So that everyone can live.

"I wasn't useful to anyone today either."

Are there nights when you look back on yourself and feel pained?

Did I achieve results at work? Was I able to support someone? Was I truly useful to anyone?

Before we know it, we have come to think of "being useful" as the "reason we are allowed to be here."

That is why, on days when we cannot prove anything, we feel as if our very existence is a mistake.

It is painful for anyone to think of themselves as a "burden," isn't it?

A life that can do nothing is the most cherished

Please try to picture a newborn baby.

A baby cannot do anything.

They cannot eat on their own, nor can they roll over. Even sleeping is difficult unless it is in someone's arms.

If you were to ask if they are useful to society, they probably aren't.

Even so, no one would say to a baby, "You have no value because you are not useful."

Rather, the adults around them try desperately to keep that life alive.

They wake up many times in the middle of the night to make milk, and rush to the hospital in a panic over a slight fever.

"That is because they will be useful when they grow up. It is an investment in the future."

Is that really so?

There are babies who are told from birth that they "will not live long." It is sad, but true.

There are also babies born with disabilities.

Even so, there are parents who try desperately to have them live happily for even one day longer.

Watching the messages from such parents, I, who have no children, wondered: "Why are they so desperate? Why can they love them so much?"

At first, I thought it might be out of a sense of duty, but as I watched and questioned "why?", it seems that is not the case at all.

Whether that life will be useful to someone in the future doesn't matter at all.
They are facing the life before them desperately, as if in prayer.

"Because I want you to be here. The fact that you are right in front of me is, simply and wholeheartedly, my deepest wish."

I thought that might be what it is.

There is meaning in someone who cannot live alone being kept alive by another, and for the person who tried to keep them alive,"the act of trying to keep someone alive"creates a meaning of its own, doesn't it?

It is certainly difficult.

Every time they eat, you have to be careful they don't choke. If you take your eyes off them for a moment, it could lead to a serious accident. It must be scary and exhausting.

Even so, they wish for it.

"I want you to live. I want you to be with me for even one day longer."

The meaning is not one-way. It is born between the life being kept alive and the effort to keep it alive, layering over and over again.

That layering creates society.

This is not limited to babies.

Isn't it the same for those who cannot move due to illness, those who have aged and need assistance, or those who have lost their mental balance and are at a standstill?

For those who sustain life, there is meaning in sustaining the life that is there.

Just because we cannot live alone does not mean we lose our meaning.

There is certainly meaning in the life that exists while being kept alive, and in the efforts of those who support that life, regardless of whether it is 'useful' or not.

Meaning also remains in lives that could not be saved.

Even so, there are lives that simply cannot be saved.

Even when medical care does everything it can, sometimes it is not enough. No matter how much those around them wish, sometimes it does not reach them.

In that case, was the effort to save them meaningless?

I do not think so.

There are many people who can now survive illnesses that were once fatal. Premature babies who would have had no choice but to give up in the past can now grow up in incubators.

That did not happen by chance; it is the result of people who were desperate to 'somehow save this person in front of me' and who have accumulated ingenuity across generations, isn't it?

In fact, no one (as far as I know) is researching life-prolonging methods for insects, but a new drug for kidney disease in cats is already taking shape.

If there were lives that no one wished to 'keep alive,' such technologies would not exist in this world.

Along the way of that accumulation, there must have been countless lives that could not be saved. However, it is precisely because someone was desperate in the face of each one of those lives that the next method was born, and someone today is surviving.

I also have a medical condition. If this were a society with no room for me to live, or if there were no medicine, I would not have been able to lead the life I have now.

Therefore, even if it was too late this time, there is surely meaning in being desperate for the life right in front of us now.

We must have heard many times through the media the words of those who have lost family members or suffered some kind of harm and are now engaged in social activities or movements.

'I don't want anyone else to go through the same thing ever again.'

Have you not also acted with that same wish?

That desperation turns into our wishes and connects to the power to save someone in the future.

Turning 'You are allowed to exist because you are useful' upside down

By the way, the idea that 'a society with diverse people has a higher ability to respond to change' is also well known.

This is because when mainstream methods no longer work, people with different ways of feeling or different strengths can sometimes find unexpected solutions.

I think so too.

However, the logic of 'you are allowed to exist because you might be useful someday' might leave behind the question 'Then, what if you are not useful?' the moment it is flipped over.

The order is reversed, isn't it?

It is not that you are allowed to exist because you are useful.

I believe that because various people live in this world, as a result, they make society resilient.

In such a world, I hope that Japan will be a society where everyone can live.

Those who can work a lot, and those who cannot work right now.
Those who are supporting someone, and those who are currently being supported.

I understand the counterargument that this is just idealism, that the burden on those who support is too great, and that there is no prospect of recovery.

That may be true.

End-of-life care. Assistance for people with disabilities. Sometimes, you may even put yourself in danger.

Even if you try that hard, the day may never come when the other person recovers and becomes a 'supporter' themselves.

It is truly painful, isn't it? Why must I work so hard? Is there any meaning to it?

That is true. And you, who are suffering so much, may also be the one who should be supported right now. It is okay to rely on the government or social welfare services. Instead of one person shouldering all the suffering, we should be able to support and think about it together.

And any suffering, including your own, will remain in the future as a baton of life.
There is meaning in connecting and aiming for something.
I am not saying that suffering is good. It is better if there is no suffering.
Even so, because of those who have suffered, we should be able to get closer to a world without suffering this time.

Therefore,

You do not have to prove whether you are useful or not.

You do not have to be judged by your value in this moment alone.
Just by being here, we have an important meaning to this world, and we will continue to hold that meaning forever.

Even if it is painful, please, stay here.
On nights when you cannot believe in your own worth, I would be happy if you could remember what I have written here.

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