Throughout the history of the Universe, no question has been asked more, whether consciously or subconsciously, than this: What is the meaning of life? Why try? Why exist? Why not just die? What is worth living for? What common value ties everything together? What’s the root of it all?
Philosophers have provided many potential answers, some orienting towards a god, others towards the soul, and others towards the natural existence. My belief rather transcends the others. The meaning of life is found when we achieve our values. Our emotional response to these achievements is what we call “happiness.”
My answer is so fundamental that it seems to be obvious. However, with outrageously increasing rates of depression and a whole culture seemingly hooked on anti-depressants, perhaps it isn’t so obvious after all.
Widespread Depression
The Western world is filled to the brim with luxuries, material products and tools for easy living. TV, the Internet, nicer vehicles, multi-million-dollar movies and mainstream music are all easily accessible to anyone who wants them.
And we’re miserable. About 15% of people in developed countries are depressed.
The causes to this emotional epidemic are often debated. Many suggest it’s mostly a biological disease. Others suggest that it’s just because we think negative thoughts, and “positive thinking” is the cure-all of depression and sadness.
Regardless, depression is on the rise even though positive thinking has exploded in popularity. I know several individuals who have literally become obsessed with “positive thinking” over the years. I’ll be writing more about this soon, but the approach simply doesn’t work. They are miserable. They spend their times trying to convince themselves that things are better rather than actually making them better.
So how can one find meaning in a world of Prozac? What’s amiss? What’s the answer to fulfillment? Why are we even here? These questions are the source of empty days and sleepless nights. This isn’t to say there hasn’t been countless attempts to answer the frustrating question.
What Does “Meaning” Even…Mean?
In the 4-Hour-Workweek, author Timothy Ferris presented a great point: the “meaning of life” question is almost self-defeating. It’s vague, implies that there must be some objective “meaning,” and even somehow emotionally suggests that if there isn’t one, then life is not as valuable.
Timothy went on to answer the question literally, which gave me a chuckle: “The meaning of life is…”, and he went on to define “life,” emphasizing the “meaning” aspect of the question. It does seem a bit vague, which is one of the reasons we often hear “fluff” answers to the pertinent question.
To make things clear, for the purpose of this site, “the Meaning of Life” shall mean “why we should decide to continue living and functioning.” Perhaps the age-old question should be, “What is the justification for life?” But regardless of the semantics of the words used, we need to understand why we wake up in the morning — and why we should.
Do we have some object to achieve while on earth? It’s been often said that on one’s deathbed, one’s life story echoes with clarity, and we realize our biggest mistakes. With that thought, let’s look at the popular beliefs regarding the “meaning of life,” to see what the right last words are.
Popular Opinions on the Meaning of Life
The following “purposes” for life are not all that there are, of course. There are literally millions, if not billions of possible answers to the basic question regarding life’s meaning. My answer is not listed below — my belief is a little more fundamental. I’ll describe in just a bit.
- Live for Others. The purpose of your life is to serve others selflessly. Your goal is to end your life being able to say, “I served others well.”
- Live for God. The purpose of your life is to serve God well. As the Westminster Confession of Faith reads, “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and enjoy Him forever.” Typically, the incentive for serving God is found in both spiritual and physical means, such as threat of a fiery hell, a beautiful heaven or peace on Earth. Your goal is to end your life being able to say, “I served God well.”
- Live for Acceptance. The purpose of your life is for people to accept you (as a friend, as a success, etc). Action should constantly be for the opinions of other people. Your goal is to end your life being able to say, “I was loved.”
- Live for Materialism. The purpose of your life is found in new clothes, nice cars, big TVs, huge houses and diamond rings. Your goal is to end your life being able to say, “My toys are bigger.”
- Live for Self-Indulgence. The purpose of your life is found in whatever you want on impulse. See something you just can’t live without? That’s what life is about! Life is about alcohol, promiscuity, parties and a mixture of acceptance and materialism. Your goal is to end your life being able to say, “That was fun.”
- Live for Survival. Life has no real purpose other than continuing the survival of the species. Your goal is to end your life being able to say, “We aren’t dead yet.”
- Live for Nothing. Some individuals claim that there is no meaning to life, no life purpose. There’s really no point.
- Live for [INSERT VALUE] There are, of course, thousands of other thoughts on this topic. Interestingly enough, nearly every one implies another even more fundamental meaning, as we’ll talk about below.
Do these “meanings” have anything in common? Are there any real reasons to believe that any of the above ideas are the real purpose for life? Yes and no.
The Fundamental Value
Of course, rather than just sift through plausible answers to the question, we should have some sort of justification. And what are the justifications given for the above meanings?
Living our lives serving others, we are told, causes us to feel great fulfillment. We feel better about ourselves, about others, and about life. In other words: the best the “serve others” philosophy can do is tell us to follow the path for the sake of empathy. In the end, it still comes back to us having some sort of incentive (enlightened or otherwise) to take action. “Service”, ironically, is founded upon personal incentive — selfishness.
The “self-interest” theme is found in all of the other life “meanings.”
“Serve God or you go to hell,” the religious explain, beckoning you to appeal to your own selfishness. Heaven is a great place, so you should follow God. You don’t want to go to Hell so follow God. God has a great plan for you. Follow God so He can love you. Each of these religious appeals is an appeal to self-interest.
This is not at all to suggest that it’s wrong to follow a religion out of self-interest; self-interest is simply the foundation of these appeals. This means that, if anything, the religion makes sense because it appeals to your self-interest.
Of course, this begs the question: “What is “self-interest?”‘ That’s a complicated way of saying that selfishness is when you do something because you want, or, more exactly, self-interest is an action one takes to achieve one’s values.
Being “selfish” does not necessarily mean harming others or not loving anyone else. That’s silly. It’s very possible to help others while still acting selfishly. For example, one can selfishly create a business for profit, yet still offer great deals and service, in turn helping others. Selfishness simply means “self gain.” Few philosophies or religions, if any, attack the idea of enjoyment, happiness or simply getting what you want. What these belief systems do attack is the idea of harming other people.
If anything, one can selfishly love others. The two are not opposite at all. The philosopher Ayn Rand explained:
“Love is an expression and assertion of self-esteem, a response to one’s own values in the person of another. One gains a profoundly personal, selfish joy from the mere existence of the person one loves. It is one’s own personal, selfish happiness that one seeks, earns, and derives from love.”
Everyone Tries to Achieve Their Values
One aspect of human behavior is simply nonnegotiable: People will always act in the cause of self-interest. One of the basic principles of economics is that everyone acts in terms of incentives — they act on the basis of potential gain. The gain might be financial (business leaders making a “profit”), emotional (we show love to others because we enjoy loving them) or other incentives. Regardless, the incentives are there.
Acting in “self-interest” simply requires one to focus on one’s own values. The cause of your values might be external, such as a God, a social group, the government or some other source. Regardless of the cause, the values are still yours.
Values might include “receiving love”, “protecting family”, “spending money”, “taking care of your body”, “drinking alcohol”, or anything else, big or small. The values don’t necessarily have to make sense to exist, but they are still individualized to every person. All of your actions reflect an appeal to these ideas; you act to achieve your own values.
Fact: All people act to achieve their values, pure and simple.
Every action you have ever taken was a reflection of your own values. Babies explore to satisfy their curiosity; men watch football to satisfy their value of competition; teenagers chat to satisfy their value of companionship; etc, etc.
This is why all of the above philosophies appeal to self-interest — it’s impossible to not. Even when a beggar asks for money, there must be some sort of incentive to the person who gives. You might feel duty to the poor, you might feel empathy towards another human being or something different entirely. Regardless, there still must be some correlation between what you do and what your values are.
Last Thoughts
This is just the beginning of a series of articles on what “happiness” really is, how to fulfill your life’s purpose, and how to live the way you need and want. Just remember: every action you take says something about your internal belief structure. This is why we hear “ideas matter” all the time. Ideas do matter.
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