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Existence precedes Essence. - Jean-Paul Sartre
It's not perfect, but it sure is a leg up over Rene Descartes' "I think, therefore, I am."
To sum up Sartre's Absurdist Existentialist position:
Facticity: We find ourselves existing in a world not of our own making & indifferent to our concerns. We are not the source of our existence, but find ourselves thrown into a world we don't control & didn't choose. All true philosophy & any real faith must begin with doubt.
Anxiety: We are faced with the lack of any external source of value & determination. We are faced with the responsibility of choosing our own nature & values, &, in doing so, we are faced with the awesome responsibility of ideally choosing values for all of humanity in our free choices.
Despair: In seeing the contrast between the world we're thrown into & which we cannot control & the possible potential absolute freedom we have to create ourselves, we must despair of any hope of external value or determination & restrict ourselves to what is under our own control. This goes back to Socrates' edict of self-knowledge as the first step to understanding anything.
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