Nihilism and 'Perfect Days', a film by Wim Wenders

'The desert grows'. Nietzsche

A primary, crucial challenge for human societies has ever been (still is) to address the pervasive war of all against all, in such a way that individuals can survive and endure the pains coming from social coexistence. Our instincts, so powerful and irrational, often source of bloody and lethal disputes, must be tamed from birth. 

First human organized groups appeared concurrently with the first religions and laws, undoubtedly needed to mitigate the unavoidable suffering from confrontations emerging amidst human beings.
Yet, taming the more animalistic aspect of Homo sapiens is a feat worthy of Sisyphus, that mythological character whose punishment consists of carrying a tremendously heavy rock uphill. Once it reaches the summit, it always rolls back down, forcing him to repeat the same effort. And this up-and-down motion repeats itself eternally. Just as gravity pulls that boulder downward, human desires, when muzzled, repressed, and suppressed, never lose strength. On the contrary, when subject to opposing forces they often get stronger.
Up to a certain point in History, people believe there is a reward in the afterlife for living a righteous life, on the grounds that the pains of earthly existence will cease for the "good and pious," provided they resign themselves to the nonsensical hedonistic excesses of this ephemeral world.
Then, in those faith times, Heaven, Hell, and Providence guaranteed that those who managed to live without sin would be rewarded in the afterlife. Since the Renaissance, however, this idea of ​​a rewarding afterlife has no longer been taken seriously. Just that is what Nietzsche refers to when Zarathustra announces that "God is dead."

In a popularized Schopenhauer's metaphor human social interaction is analogous to porcupine's crowding to heat each other in hard winter. Sooner or later proximity causes bloody stings.
For us, thorns come from conflicting desires among group members, since most wants are never fully complementary to others, except for brief periods of shared illusions.

Nowadays, the afterlife is no longer enough to give meaning to the concrete, inevitable sufferings of life, nor is it even enough to make existence more bearable. Peace is only ensured by denial, through the radical rejection of everything that can generate conflict, frustration, and pain. Perfect days cannot involve romantic involvement, attachment to people, the desire to compete, the pursuit of money, family relationships, or professional ambition. Everything that can bring pleasure is risky, generating conflict and painful wounds, often lethal in the short or long term. Therefore, perfection can only come from settling for peace. A true and lasting peace, hardly distinguishable from the peace of cemeteries.

Brazilian literature offers us an aphorism related to Hirayama's choices:Riobaldo Tatarana, from "Grande Sertão: Veredas," by the great philosophizing writer João Guimarães Rosa, says:
"Living is very dangerous!"
From this truth, the choice of the "last human" [letzter Mensch] from "Thus Spoke Zarathustra," a figure Hirayama perfectly embodies, is to escape all dangers. He simply persists on Earth in terrible solitude, devoid of any expectations.