# Sisyphus Pushing a Boulder Sisyphus Pushing a Boulder is a long-running meme format that pastes the Greek myth of Sisyphus, cursed by Hades to push a boulder uphill for eternity, over jokes about mundane daily tasks. Image macros trace back to 2011 on Know Your Meme, and the template spiked again in early 2023 after a viral TikTok argued Sisyphus 'gets stronger.' ## Origin The earliest Sisyphus meme cataloged on Know Your Meme was posted on November 20th, 2011 by user Olex Xelo as a riff on the 'They see me rollin' template, captioning Sisyphus's boulder-pushing with the song's lyrics[3]. Similar 'They see me rollin' Sisyphus edits had circulated online as early as 2009, though those posts went uncredited[3]. The format took on its more distinctly imageboard character on May 24th, 2014, when an anon on 4chan's /sp/ board posted a Sisyphus drawing with his face replaced by Feels Guy and the boulder replaced by Feels Bad Man Pepe[4]. That image kept getting reused across 4chan through the mid-2010s, including in an October 11th, 2015 /fit/ greentext where an anon compared lifting to Sisyphus's task[3]. - **Platform:** Know Your Meme / 4chan (Wojak edits) / Twitter and TikTok (viral spread) - **Creator:** Unknown - **Date:** 2011 ## Overview The meme takes Sisyphus, the king of Ephyra whom Hades condemned to shove a boulder up a hill forever, only to watch it roll back down each time, and drops that punishment on top of ordinary annoyances like replying to email or going to the gym[1]. The gag lives in the mismatch: mythic, eternal suffering paired with something trivially small. Visually the format shows up in a few flavors. There are photo edits of classical paintings and sculptures, hand-drawn MS Paint versions, Wojak edits where Sisyphus's face is swapped for Feels Guy and the boulder for the Feels Bad Man version of Pepe the Frog[4], and TikTok video overlays that drop clips of Sisyphus onto scenes from games, films and TV[3]. Later variants often carry Albert Camus's closing line from The Myth of Sisyphus, 'One Must Imagine Sisyphus Happy,' as the caption[3]. ## How It Spread Twitter carried the meme into its 2020s wave. On May 25th, 2020, the account @analytical_shit posted an 'Are you winning, son?' edit built around Sisyphus, picking up roughly 3,600 likes over the following year[2]. Less than a month later, on June 19th, 2020, @jakebrodes stacked the Sisyphus setup with the 'Wait, it's all Ohio?' template and pulled in about 21,200 likes across the next three years[5]. In mid-August 2021, a wave dubbed 'Sisyphus Puns' (also filed as 'Greek Mythology Puns' or 'I Had A Joke About Sisyphus') took off on Twitter, following a snowclone that read 'I had a joke about X, but…' traced back to a July 31st tweet[3]. The pun format kept the myth in circulation as low-effort Twitter shitpost fuel. The biggest resurgence came in early 2023. On January 29th, TikToker @awakenatlas posted a clip arguing that 'we're kind of missing the point of the Sisyphus myth. He gets stronger,' reframing the punishment as a hidden reward inside a daily routine, and the video pulled around 191,900 plays and 19,800 likes in four days[6]. On January 31st, @seungylee14 quoted the clip on Twitter and picked up about 90,500 likes in two days[7], while @Money__Doug's quote retweet with the video attached hit roughly 980,000 views and 28,600 likes in the same window[8]. Backlash was quick, with @tallntran's rebuttal earning about 88,800 likes on February 1st[3]. That July, the Camus line 'One Must Imagine Sisyphus Happy' spread on TikTok as overlays of Sisyphus over game, show and film clips, commonly scored to Duster's 'Me and the Birds'[3]. ## How to Use The image-macro version typically labels the boulder or hill with a small, unglamorous task (Slack replies, refilling the Brita, laundry) so the mythic punishment reads as absurd overkill. The Wojak variant swaps Sisyphus's face for Feels Guy and the boulder for Feels Bad Man Pepe, and often shows up in greentexts about gym routines or grind work[4]. On TikTok, the common convention is to overlay footage of Sisyphus pushing the boulder onto a video-game, TV or film clip that mirrors a repetitive loop, with 'One Must Imagine Sisyphus Happy' as the caption and Duster's 'Me and the Birds' as the audio[3]. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What is Sisyphus Pushing a Boulder? It's an internet joke format built on the Greek myth of Sisyphus, who was sentenced by Hades to push a boulder uphill forever, used as a stand-in for boring or repetitive daily tasks[1]. ### Where did Sisyphus Pushing a Boulder come from? The earliest version cataloged on Know Your Meme was posted by user Olex Xelo on November 20th, 2011 as a riff on the 'They see me rollin' template[3]. ### What does Sisyphus Pushing a Boulder mean? The joke maps the myth of endless futile labor onto ordinary chores or work, treating small annoyances as if they were eternal punishment, and later ties in Camus's line 'One Must Imagine Sisyphus Happy'[3]. ### How do you use Sisyphus Pushing a Boulder? Label the boulder or hill with a trivial task in an image macro, or overlay Sisyphus footage on unrelated media on TikTok, often paired with the Camus quote and Duster's 'Me and the Birds'[3]. ### Is Sisyphus Pushing a Boulder still popular? The template had a major spike in early 2023 after @awakenatlas's 'he gets stronger' TikTok went viral through reposts by @seungylee14 and @Money__Doug[7]. ## References 1. [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0136%3Abook%3D11]() 2. [https://twitter.com/analytical_shit]() 3. [https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/sisyphus-pushing-a-boulder]() 4. [https://archive.4plebs.org/sp/]() 5. [https://twitter.com/jakebrodes]() 6. [https://www.tiktok.com/@awakenatlas]() 7. [https://twitter.com/seungylee14/status/1620546196560551936]() 8. [https://twitter.com/Money__Doug]() --- Source: https://meme.com/memes/sisyphus-pushing-a-boulder Published by meme.com — The Internet Meme Library