The Meaning of Life

  Sometimes, as we grow older, we tend to become a little more philosophical. We start to look at the bigger picture and ask ourselves those really hard questions. Questions like: Is there a God? How did we get here? Are we alone in the Universe? And what exactly is the meaning of Life? Well I guess I’ve always been a little more inquisitive than most. I’ve asked myself these questions basically all my life. However, now that I am so much older, these questions do weigh more heavily on my mind. And I’ve spent a lot of time and effort trying to figure out some answers. Here’s what I’ve come up with so far. Is there a God? Yes. And if you ask how I know this to be true, the answer is I don’t.  I simply chose to believe this because I don’t like the alternative. How did we get here? Again we’re dealing with my beliefs here because science and its theory of evolution have not convinced me otherwise. I believe that God created the system we find ourselves in, and then breathed life into it. Did He/She/It (or IAM – if you prefer) create man out of dust like the Bible says? Maybe not. Did man and life in general evolve from inanimate matter into living organisms strictly as some kind of cosmic accident? I think definitely not. Are we alone in the universe? Don’t be ridiculous. And does the I AM care more about one part of his creation than another – again don’t be ridiculous.

  So with the above given mindset, let’s get on with the biggy. What is the meaning of life? And as a precursor: does life have to have a meaning?  You know this morning I sat outside on my deck watching a very contented cat playing in the yard chasing and pouncing on leaves. My cat doesn’t worry about anything but her next meal, playing, sleeping, and practicing her hunting skills. She was a very good caring mother for the one litter of kittens I allowed her to have. But does her life have meaning beyond that? Scientists would say that her kind fills an evolutionary niche and that her life has no validity beyond that. I’m not so sure about that. They say the same thing about us by the way. I would argue all day about that one. And if those arguments I would make are valid for me, I would think they would also be valid for my cat and any other life form as far as that goes.

  But let’s limit ourselves to human life at the moment – we tend to be a little egocentric that way anyhow. What exactly is our purpose for being? Most of us spend at least four fifths of our life working at some job or another. Were we born to be carpenters, welders, bankers, teachers, lawyers, doctors, politicians, etc.? And is the sole point of these pursuits to garner for ourselves the basic necessities of life like food, shelter, and procreation? We certainly spend an inordinate amount of our time worrying about those things. But most of us go way beyond securing the basic necessities.  In the good old USA, we are also driven by rampant materialism to procure the so called “American Dream”.  To Wall Street and corporate America, it would seem that our only purpose is to accumulate stuff. But why? Why do we need so much stuff? We can’t take it with us when we die. Most of the time, our kids have accumulated their own stuff and don’t really need ours piled on top after we’re gone.

  So I’m more and more convinced that we are the victims of a gigantic scheme to keep us continuously in bondage chained to the grind stone like beasts of burden – dumbed down and thoughtless about our real purpose for being here. Those who have engineered this grand scheme have always profited greatly from the fruits of our labor. But just like the rest of us, they can’t take those profits with them. But they don’t seem to worry so much about that. Their only concern seems to be the same as King Midas - how big the pile of gold in front of them is. They have determined that to achieve their goal of always amassing great piles of wealth for its own sake their best bet is to keep society materialistic, atheistic, and to this end ensure that they remain thoughtless automatons.  So is this the meaning of life? Is it your conscious desire to be a thoughtless automaton in the big machine of industrial society? If so, then welcome to your dreary life. Is this your only purpose for being here? And if so, what exactly is the point? Why do we bother? Why would/should we? If such a society would go down in flames tomorrow, what would it matter? The Universe would go on without blinking an eye. No one or nothing would care. The whole thing would have been one gigantic waste of time. Sooner or later that will come to pass for each of us and all of humanity. If I truly believed that this was the only purpose for me being here, I would end it now. Accumulating stuff has never been all that important to me and not what life is or should be all about. To my mind, the only thing really worth having, and the one thing you can take with you, is love. Can you love if your mind is filled with the want and pursuit of material things? Can you love if your mind is filled with hate and jealousy?

  So my answer to the question of what is our purpose or the meaning of life would be love. To love others, love life, love the one who gave us life. Most of us already love ourselves when we get here. That is no big accomplishment. But to learn to love other than ourselves seems to me to be the whole reason why we’re here. To love unconditionally is no easy thing. It’s something that many of us sadly never achieve. But it is the one thing that makes all the rest of it worthwhile. So before it’s too late, maybe you should take a little time to examine your own life. Is way too much of it spent on worrying about stuff? Is your heart filled with want, or is it overflowing with love? It’s a simple question and seemingly a simple answer. It’s what Jesus was said to have harped on. A heart filled with love is less likely to go astray. One filled with want is more likely to commit sins against his/her fellow man. Therefore, maybe the ultimate purpose for life really is as simple as you’re here to make a choice. So what’s it going to be? Will you choose love and a righteous path? Or will you choose never ending materialism scratching and clawing your way to more and more stuff?  No matter how old you are, you still have time to make the choice.