Meaning is what is meant, be it by a person who asks me a question, or by a situation which, too, implies a question and calls for an answer” (p. 62) and “there is only one meaning to each situation, and this is its true meaning”
– Viktor Frankl
He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.
– Friedruck Nietzsche
If your dreams do not scare you, they are not big enough.
– Ellen Johnson Sirleaf
It’s not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it.
– Lucius Annaeus Seneca
The degree to which we explain is exactly the decree to which we loose meaning.
– NA
Awareness of death is the condition of life's meaningfulness.
– Corey Anton
A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself. What a man can be, he must be.”
— Abraham Maslow
…if we are to have peace in the world, men and nations must embrace the nonviolent affirmation that ends and means must cohere. One of the great philosophical debates of history has been over the whole question of means and ends. And there have always been those who argued that the end justifies the means, that the means really aren’t important. The important thing is to get to the end, you see. So, if you’re seeking to develop a just society, they say, the important thing is to get there, and the means are really unimportant; any means will do so long as they get you there? they may be violent, they may be untruthful means; they may even be unjust means to a just end. There have been those who have argued this throughout history. But we will never have peace in the world until men everywhere recognize that ends are not cut off from means, because the means represent the ideal in the making, and the end in process, and ultimately you can’t reach good ends through evil means, because the means represent the seed and the end represents the tree.
– MLK Jr.
splitting up between from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sjennrn5LNA&t=4s
"enjoyable usefulness"
we are not looking for propositional meaning its insufficient for what our heart longs for
fundament meaningfullness is about all behavior ultimately grounds in fitness skin-in-the-game, grounding
meaning is not something we experienced in an instant, meaning is a realization and assessments that we have when we look at our lives, that we are able to attend to what was important to us, meaning is momentum of choice woven together through time
The good life
Carl Rogers describes which words are well suited to describe The Good Life:
I believe it will have become evident why, for me, adjectives such as happy, contented, blissful, enjoyable, do not seem quite appropriate to any general description of this process I have called the good life, even though the person in this process would experience each one of these at the appropriate times. But adjectives which seem more generally fitting are adjectives such as enriching, exciting, rewarding, challenging, meaningful. This process of the good life is not, I am convinced, a life for the fainthearted. It involves the stretching and growing of becoming more and more of one's potentialities. It involves the courage to be. It means launching oneself fully into the stream of life. Yet the deeply exciting thing about human beings is that when the individual is inwardly free, he chooses as the good life this process of becoming." – Carl Rogers
Alan Watts once said something similar to: to plan for a future outcome without the ability to enjoy it is stupid. And what makes you so sure about your ability to enjoy it?
How to live a meaningful life:
Appreciate the beauty of existence. Beauty doesn’t exist in objects. It arises from the relationship of the subject appreciating the object. Meaning is inherently relational. The depth of our appreciation of the beauty of the world increases the meaningfulness of the world. When we are with friends, meditating, listening to music, watching the sunset, laughing at comedy…we are taking in the beauty of reality in that form. That is why we enjoy it and what we are longing for when we desire those experiences. When we are conscious of this, we can deepen our appreciation, and with it, both the joyfulness and meaningfulness of the experience. This is the mode of Being.
Add to the beauty of existence. Picking up trash, creating art, complementing someone, alleviating poverty, inventing technology that improves life, expanding the field of what we know about reality, raising children lovingly, planting trees, sharing things of value we have learned…are all ways to add to the beauty of existence. This is inherently meaningful. The beauty of reality evolved through your action. This is the mode of doing.
Increase your ability to appreciate and add to the beauty of existence. Deepen your ability to recognize beauty everywhere. To take it in. To be touched and moved by it. To feel gratitude, reverence, awe. And develop your capacities and willingness to add beauty. Not just in a narrow domain you call a vocation…but in all the situations and ways you can. Every skill, every insight, every tool and capacity…has a role to play in the evolution of life - in the evolution of the beauty of reality. This is the mode of becoming.
Most actions are other than conscious, and even conscious actions are flavored with other than conscious subtleties. These arise from what has been previously conditioned, i.e., from one’s being. Being influences doing. Doing in turn is conditioning us. Doing affects how we are changing and becoming. Becoming is in turn changing the integrated state of who we are - being. Being, doing, and becoming are equally fundamental, inseparable, and inter affecting, in a ring. The cycle can be vicious or virtuous.
Everything that is meaningful is one of these three. Engaging in all three consciously as a virtuous cycle leads to a maximally meaningful life. All three are ultimately inspired by love.