You have a higher purpose.
You may not realize it, but it’s there.
People are not just intelligent animals, who come, strut their stuff for an all-too-brief moment, then leave this unchanged and uncaring universe. If you thought this or believe it to be true, it’s no wonder that you might feel your life has no meaning. It’s no wonder that you might feel sad or depressed, that you wonder what it’s all about, feel that your life is out of control, or sometimes think that it’s OK to take desperate measures. It’s no wonder that suicides, both the kind where you go by yourself and the ones where you take a few folks with you, are up.
After all, if you’ve got no reason to live, you’ve got no reason to live. However, the science and math of the last century has shown this conception of reality to be untrue, and has shown us a way out.
It’s shown us that we are vital to this universe. It’s shown us that there is a purpose for our lives, and we have a reason to be here – we have a reason to live.
We are, each and every one of us, here to make this world, in some way, shape or form, a better place. Each of us, if we look closely, can find a purpose that we hold dear, a purpose that’s interesting and stimulating, a purpose which calls out the best in us, a purpose which makes sense of it all, a purpose which breathes meaning and life into what has been our otherwise dreary lives.
We have been told for too long now that our lives mean nothing, and that is simply untrue. Our lives mean everything, and knowing that, and knowing how it comes to be is the key to happiness and meaning. We might have to dig through piles of false data and bogus ideas, we might have to re-evaluate much of what we’ve been taught as true, but the truth is there, waiting.
A noted clinical psychologist, when asked, “what produces joy?”, stated that the final achievement of a goal was not what produces joy – it was making some sort of measurable progress toward a decent goal. Knowing where you’re trying to go, knowing why you’re trying to get there, and knowing that you’re making progress at it is what produces joy and/or happiness. It’s not the arriving – it’s the trip.
I suppose we should take a moment and address the question, “what is happiness?” It’s not thrills, it’s not kicks, it’s not short-lived physical ecstasy, it’s not transient pleasures, it’s not the glee of the moment. These are all lame substitutes for actual happiness, arriving for the moment, and passing just as quickly, leaving an empty space where the meaning of your life should have been.
What is happiness, really? It’s a long-lasting (maybe life-long) sense of meaning, of peace, of fulfillment, of knowing that you are truly worth something, that your life has meaning and that the world is a better place for you being in it. How do you get that? By being worth something. How do you get that? By making some progress on accomplishing something of value to yourself and others.
Doing that requires knowing what true value actually is. True value is some sort of improvement of the conditions of LIFE – making your life better, making you more able, making the LIFE of others better or stronger, somehow getting a leg up on the degradation and depredations occurring daily as a result of living in this universe. More LIFE means more order, more aesthetic, more ability, more competence, more beauty, more love, more being, more purpose, more peace, more happiness.
Each of us has different skills, different preferences, different viewpoints. However, each of us can work within our individual skillsets, preferences and viewpoints to do something decent. Figuring out how to do that and then doing it is the key to happiness.
So – life is more than money, more than hookups, more than highs or kicks. Life, your life, has meaning, and that meaning is sitting there waiting for you to find it. Find it, and the promises of the eons are yours.