Essay 1 - The Meaning of Life: Who Wants to Know?

If you happen to mention The Meaning of Life at a social gathering, it is unlikely that people will start gravitating over towards you in order to gain from your wisdom on this important issue. In fact, it is far more likely that you will be greeted with suspicious looks from all those within earshot as they begin drifting away in the opposite direction. Why is this?

There are people who think that the answer to the question – “What is the meaning of life?” – is the single most important answer to the single most important question that a person can ask. And there are others who think it is just silly to ask such questions. Most people are somewhere in between although those who think it is an important question are very much in the minority. Most people do not put “Figure out the Meaning of Life” on their to do list.

People tend to leave questions about life and its meaning to special moments brought on by special circumstances. The loss of a loved one or a crisis in one’s life might prompt them to ask – “What does it all mean?”. So, a better way to think about this might be that most people do not worry about the meaning of life most of the time. But, when they do think about it, they would really like to have an answer.

Victor Frankl, a disciple of Freud, and a concentration camp survivor, felt that the search for meaning was man’s most important and powerful drive. People like to think that their life means something and that their suffering is not in vain. But it does not have to be just tragedy. Celebrities, who are wildly successful, often become disoriented by their own success and try (often unsuccessfully) to find meaning in it.

Survivors of a catastrophe, such as a plane crash, often have trouble reconciling their blessing with a tragedy for others and attempt (again, often unsuccessfully) to find meaning in their survival. Perhaps they have special purpose or something. And, for many, it is more mundane. A life that used to be satisfying is suddenly no longer satisfying leaving them wondering what it is all about. So, the answer the question – “Who wants to know?” – may be “Perhaps not everybody all the time but nearly everybody from time to time”.

We are going to lay some groundwork for this question and build up to the answer carefully so the reader will not be overwhelmed by having it plunked down on them all at once. I ask the reader to be patient and keep an open mind. If you seriously consider what I have to say, I think you will find it to be a satisfying (and perhaps unexpected) response to the question if not the only satisfying answer.

The reason we need to provide some groundwork is because, before we can answer anything about the meaning of life, we must ask, “What do we mean by meaning?” 

This essay is a little over 500 words and the audio is a little short of 4 minutes long.