Hi Jen,

Gosh, your question could be answered in a personal way, or it could be the start of some serious philosophy!

In my view, a lot of people get started in a study of philosophy from a personal crisis - life becomes so weird and frightening that they ask the questions that philosophers down the ages have struggled with.

For instance, Plato himself asked your question - "Is life just a dream." By various ingenious arguments he concluded that we are asleep now and we wake up when we die.

I wouldn't recommend reading Plato if your feeling fragile, but it might be some comfort to know that so many people have been down the road before us. World literature is full of existential anxiety. I felt better when I realised that so many bright and intelligent people have been where I am; it kind of made me feel like one of them.

People used to say to me, "You think too much." Well, I'm not the only one. There are quite few of us!

Cheers, M