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L’enfer, c’est moi-même

Recently, I decided to purchase the book Huis Clos by Sartre due to having used the phrase, "L'enfer, c'est les autres" on a site of mine. If you aren't familiar with the phrase, it basically means, "Hell, it's other people." At the time I selected that phrase, I had been pretty disappointed at the world in general and the people around me.

As a true internet dork who is pretty well incapable of easy exchanges with other people, I have oftentimes blamed others for my unhappiness with life. After purchasing the book (and I haven't yet read the book, since it's shipping from Amazon), I came to realize that the more applicable phrase for me would really be "L'enfer, c'est moi-même" or "Hell, it's myself."

Why precisely would hell be me? If I'm honest with myself, then the decisions I make, places I go, people I meet and interact with, and the words I say are all my own doing. By blaming other people for any hell I have (unhappiness) on earth, I'm absolving myself of the responsibility for my life. If hell is the people I'm around now, then I should find other people where I don't feel like I'm in hell. If the decisions I make cause me to be unhappy, I should start making better decisions. Most of all, my thought processes that frequently lead me to sadness due to thinking about past events or current events, these are my thoughts that I'm obsessing over repeatedly. No-one else is bringing up these events or ideas to lead me into unhappiness and insanity.


When I take responsibility and am truthful, hell isn't other people--it's me, myself and I.

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