The meaning of life

To figure out the meaning of life, you first have to understand what life is.


Derek Sivers is a genius. I think so at least. He has a great article on the meaning of life over at: http://sivers.org/ml  He comes to the humanist conclusion that life doesn’t have any intrinsic meaning. You are free to project any meaning you want. In short, you are free to do with your life anything you want.

But it’s his analysis along the way that I think is so helpful.  He starts his article by asking – what is life?  And he tries out some answers.  Like life is time. Finite time, so perhaps you should strive to use it wisely. His advice on how to do this is to balance your future focused thinking with your present focused thinking.

  • Life is also about choice. So choose wisely.  How, again, the answer is balance. Sometimes let your gut decide, sometimes stop at good enough, set ethical limits for yourself and work on what is important, not necessarily urgent.
  • Life is about memories and reflection. If you don’t ever do anything, you won’t have anything worth remembering. On the other hand, reflection is important to. Once again, balance is key.
  • Life is also about learning. We all learn throughout our lives. Be of the mindset that you can always learn more and always improve. 

My take away from his article is that while life has no intrinsic meaning, we still need a purpose in life. And if we are seeking to be self-fulfilled, and who isn’t, perhaps what we should seek is balance. Because that seems to be the key to everything.

Making wise choices about how to spend your life requires balance.


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