What if the quest for meaning is, in itself, meaningless? Which is why today I’m writing about the existential crisis of the soul as many people struggle with the ultimate meaning of life. You may have asked, What is your place in the world? Why are you here? Does any of this matter? Wise men and women, philosophers, psychologists, emperors, kings, peasants, sages, entertainers, rulers, mothers, and fathers, the list goes on of individuals attempting to solve the riddle of the meaning of existence.
Ecclesiastes opens with the phrase:
“Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher. “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.”
– Ecclesiastes 1:2
For quite some time, I entreated this idea as a mantra, initially from a nihilistic point of view bent and forged out of the cold anger and resentment that life hadn’t given me what I had hoped for. However, it eventually began to transform into a warm sentiment, comforting me as I began to contemplate why life needed to have meaning associated with it in the first place.
After all, meaning and purpose are, in and of themselves, meaningless.
Why?
We search for meaning because it gives us a sense of purpose. Without meaning, what is the purpose of our existence? This, however, is a limited view of what it means to be alive. After all, humans are the only lifeforms on the planet who struggle with this concept.
Observations in Nature
In nature, you will never observe a jaguar resting on the riverbank, staring at its prey and wondering about its purpose in the world. No! It’s staring at its prey with such focus and determination that purpose and meaning are irrelevant and meaningless. It doesn’t need to extrapolate meaning from its survival because survival is its meaning.
Elephants do not congregate to discuss existentialism and whether they are doing enough within the overarching experience we call life.
They’re just living.
Their whole purpose or meaning is survival, which includes eating, drinking, sleeping, and procreation. That’s it!
Aside from human beings, every animal in the animal kingdom lives without expectations or desires. They just live.
After a meal, what do lions do? They lay around resting and sleeping until the need for another meal arises. At which point, the hunt is on. They then repeat this cycle until they are too old to hunt. Eventually, they wander off to die a peaceful death unless attacked by a roving band of jackals, which, incidentally, are doing the same thing that lions do. So, the cycle continues.
The great circle of life…
The Struggle for Meaning
On the other hand, humans cannot be satisfied with such a stale, pitiful, dare I say, meaningless existence.
After all, we are designed for so much more! Aren’t we?
Our cognitive abilities require an excess of stimulation beyond the scope of mere survival. We need entertainment, pizazz, scandal, atrocities, adventure, and so on to coddle our inability to cope with the fact that living is, in all actuality, a very simple process.
Simple process’ is a diminutive term, however, as there is nothing simple about survival. Survival, in and of itself, is exceptionally challenging, as evidenced in watching shows such as Alone or Naked and Afraid, among many others.
During survival, humans were and are much more centered on the realities of the world in which they live. Their purpose or meaning reduced to the mere expectations of what it takes to survive another day.
In non-survival, which occurs when civilization exits the hunter-gatherer phase, the feeling of not struggling to survive gives way to contemplating existential crises of varying magnitudes. Meaning and purpose begin to plague us.
If our tribe is self-sufficient and, just throwing an arbitrary number out here, a hundred or more strong, and we now have time on our hands, what do we do?
There has to be more to life than this, right?
Now, there’s a need to attain more.
As a result, we begin to create. We learn to entertain. However, that’s not enough for some. The desire for power begins to resonate within certain individuals, and the thought, “This tribe needs a better leader.” begins to enter the minds of a select few.
It’s not that the tribe needs a better leader; rather, the idea that an individual feels meaningless or without purpose drives the rationale that they could do better than the currently appointed leader, so dissension is born.
A revolution occurs. Heads roll, and a new institution is created. One built on blood, power, and greed.
As such, war becomes inevitable as the insatiable hunger to find meaning and purpose drives the necessity to conquer, strip, and destroy other tribes for the sake of expansion. In reality, stroking the king’s ego to make him feel he’s serving a purpose in life.
In our modern era, meaning entails riches and luxury. Doing whatever’s necessary, at whatever cost, in many instances, to achieve the particular status the individual assumes will provide meaning in their life.
Though this is nothing new, it is the reason for the world’s high levels of fraud, exploitation, corruption, and manipulation.
It’s chasing after something as if there is something to be eternally gained via the pursuit.
Alan Watts stated this quite elegantly in his book “The Book”:
“What we see as death, empty space, or nothingness is only the trough between the crests of this endlessly waving ocean. It is all part of the illusion that there should seem to be something to be gained in the future, and that there is an urgent necessity to go on and on until we get it. Yet just as there is no time but the present, and no one except the all-and-everything, there is never anything to be gained—though the zest of the game is to pretend that there is.”
Watts, Alan. The Book. Vintage Books. 1989
Meaning is Simple: Be Present
The meaning of life is a straightforward matter that is often overlooked because, after all, how could it be this simple? And what is that meaning?
To live!
It’s what the sages have been teaching for thousands of years.
Essentially, it’s the core tenant of being present. When you are present, you can experience all the joy, peace, and love in the world. However, it can be challenging to experience those feelings in the past or future.
Not that you can’t remember past situations with fondness or feel the future experience of love, but neither of those things are real. You make it real by bringing it into your present moment. Yet, how often do you only focus on those things that are uplifting and good when considering past and future moments? The focus is frequently on the negative and the things that did, can, or will go wrong.
When you live in the present, though, all you have is this one moment; no other moments exist, and as a result, you don’t strive for meaning or purpose because your meaning and purpose become irrelevant as the present moment is all that matters.
For most people, living within the scope of the present moment is impossible. This is not because they are incapable of living in that place but because living there requires extreme discipline of the mind and body.
This is one of the reasons Jesus spoke of the narrow gate that leads to life and the broad road that leads to destruction.
“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”
– Matthew 7:13-14
Within the overarching theme of Christianity, most people would regulate this down to the simple idea of “getting into heaven.” The broad road equated to sin, and the narrow referencing righteousness.
But it’s more than that.
Jesus is talking about a specific discipline that most people aren’t willing to take on because it is difficult to maintain—the ultimate discipline of the mind and body. And if you take this idea and look back through the rest of the Sermon on the Mount, you’ll find that many of the things he teaches require this level of discipline.
This discipline allowed him to fast for 40 days and nights in the wilderness. After his resurrection, his disciples adopted this discipline, allowing them to suffer a martyr’s fate.
It can also be found among the yogis of India and the Buddhist monks of India, China, and Japan. Many of the medicine doctors and healers from around the world practiced this type of discipline. There are many individuals today who practice this as well.
When you start to listen to or read the wisdom passed down by these individuals, you find that it all leads back to the present moment, and within the present moment, there is no need for meaning and purpose.
Instead of doing something with the desire to fulfill your destiny and attribute meaning and purpose to your actions, you simply live. From that place, you can begin to do what’s necessary within the world, not because you must do it, but because you want to, knowing that it will only make the world a better place.
However, since you no longer need to live for meaning and purpose, you could just as easily walk away and let the world eat itself.
I don’t believe this would be the case, though, as the enjoyment of involving yourself in the healing of the world would bring you an intense feeling of meaning and purpose.
What a juxtaposition! How can this be?
Just because you don’t ascribe meaning and purpose to your life, it doesn’t mean you don’t feel a sense of meaning or purpose when you apply yourself in a way that benefits others.
You should experience a wealth of meaning as you do so, the difference being that when compared to someone else, you aren’t chasing it. Instead, it’s a byproduct of who you are, not something to be found outside yourself.
Finding Meaning in Your Life
However, this doesn’t mean you can’t find meaning and purpose outside the realm of living in the present moment. There are many ways to do so, though you may find yourself chasing after them and wondering what they were all for when you look back on your life.
Many of these ideas come to us in stages, depending on where we are in our internal growth and development. Beating yourself up for doing it “wrong” won’t help anything. After all, I’m not sure anyone knows the “right way.”
That’s why there are so many schools of philosophy and varying religions. Humans are constantly trying to understand what life is all about.
The never-ending quest!
Yet, if you’re struggling in life, you can do things to ascribe meaning to your existence that can help you overcome your struggles.
In his book, Man’s Search for Meaning, Viktor Frankl provides an example of how a goal-oriented approach can positively affect individuals struggling to overcome their circumstances.
Unfortunately, in his case, his struggle, and the struggle of those around him, were centered around their survival in the Nazi concentration camps. Yet, even amid the death and destruction, meaning was found. He writes:
“I remember two cases of would-be suicide, which bore a striking similarity to each other. Both men had talked of their intentions to commit suicide. Both used the typical argument—they had nothing more to expect from life. In both cases it was a question of getting them to realize that life was still expecting something from them; something in the future was expected of them. We found, in fact, that for the one it was his child whom he adored and who was waiting for him in a foreign country. For the other it was a thing, not a person. This man was a scientist and had written a series of books which still needed to be finished. His work could not be done by anyone else, any more than another person could ever take the place of the father in his child’s affections.
This uniqueness and singleness which distinguishes each individual and gives a meaning to his existence has a bearing on creative work as much as it does on human love. When the impossibility of replacing a person is realized, it allows the responsibility which a man has for his existence and its continuance to appear in all its magnitude. A man who becomes conscious of the responsibility he bears toward a human being who affectionately waits for him, or to an unfinished work, will never be able to throw away his life. He knows the “why” for his existence, and will be able to bear almost any “how.”
Frankl, Viktor. Man’s Search for Meaning. Beacon Press. 2006
Most people cannot comprehend the horrors the men and women in those Nazi concentration camps had to endure, and yet, people today still suffer many of the same emotional maladies that those in concentration camps suffered.
Today’s age is one of the easiest and most convenient humans have ever experienced, yet mental and emotional health is crumbling. People everywhere and from all stations are suffering their “ease.”
Life has become so easy; we’re making up things to suffer. We’re depressed because our boss doesn’t like us or we didn’t get that promotion. It’s not that humans didn’t like each other thousands of years ago or never looked over someone for whatever reason.
It’s that there were more things to worry about, there was something else more demanding, and life required more from you, which kept you from falling into emotional turmoil such as depression.
Comparison didn’t rear its ugly head as often, either. Instead of having thousands of people seemingly better than you shoved in your face all day, like we do thanks to social media apps and technology, you had a few people you might see or know who seemed like they were better off than you. It’s not that it didn’t exist, but it wasn’t as prevalent.
Regardless, we’ll continue to strive and derive meaning from what we do, thinking it makes us who we are when, in reality, you are you, and that should be enough.
If you’re stressed out right now because you can’t seem to find meaning in your life or your present circumstances, I’m here to tell you that it’s okay.
You are okay!
You don’t have to have it all figured out. All you need to do is remember to live. Be thankful for today and for what it is without judgment.
As you move forward, you could adopt the mindset that everything is meaningless and that the only thing that matters is the present moment. I pray that you will begin to find massive amounts of meaning as you do so.
Share with your friends and family. I look forward to next time.
Josiah
