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Why bother conserving resources, in that situation? Why plant trees? We didn't all collectively agree to stop planning for the future. We all just kind of lost our motivation. When I look around at my social circle of young, extremely online creative types, I see the same thing. But ...

Related: 5 Weird Ways The Rich Are Preparing For The Apocalypse

Close your eyes and imagine yourself at age 80 (if you're already that age, I guess you can skip this part).

Did you immediately wonder whether the world would look more like Blade Runner or Fallout, a corporate dystopia or a gray sprawl of ruins? But I didn't tell you to imagine the world as it exists when you're 80 -- you can't control that part -- but to imagine yourself. What will you be like? Will you have gotten control over your anxiety? Gotten better at making friends? Improved your diet and health routine? Will you have built a proud career off an impressive skill?

Will you be happy?

If you're in the "We're all screwed regardless" brigade, you're thinking that's all petty bullshit. What does that matter when the world is falling apart? But your future happiness isn't going to be based on what's happening in "the world." If we wind up with a Star Trek utopia, you personally could still wind up drinking yourself to death in an alley. I know this, because people still drink themselves to death in alleys today, even though we're living in what would have looked like a Star Trek utopia to someone 200 years ago.

"But the world is ending!" What do you think that means? That the credits will roll and you'll be free from worry? When they say "The end of the world" they just mean society will be disrupted -- the institutions you depend on may become unreliable, goods that are plentiful and cheap now may become rare and expensive. But even in the worst-case scenario for climate collapse, there will still be such a thing as jobs and bills and marriage in 2060. You'll still have to manage your time and health, you'll still be attending birthday parties and weddings. People will still be making friends, falling in love and having babies. There will still be artists and writers.

In fact, even if you are part of a smattering of scrappy humans who've survived an actual goddamned Meteor O'Death, you'll still be fighting your internal battles over depression, addiction, lack of motivation, or whatever else is tripping you up now. Whatever happens to the world, you're going to experience it through the very body and personality you're building today. The only difference is, there will be far, far less margin for error for people who can't get up and do productive work.

That's why the Meteor O'Death (and all that it wrongly implies) is a coping mechanism, in the sense that just staying in bed all day is also a coping mechanism. "Nothing I do matters" is a liberating thought.