What more could you ask for?

I was reading my last post, and it struck me that my 'list' might sound like boasting. It isn't. All I am saying is that through great luck and some effort, I was able to accomplish what so many at my age are still striving for. It isn't that I am ungrateful.

That's not it at all. I am very lucky. I was born in a great country, into a great family. Despite, or perhaps because, of choices I have made, things have turned out this way. I just want to find out why.

It isn't due to dissatisfaction, or boredom, or greed. I have tasted richness and depth and, though rarely, transcendence. I have traveled to some pretty amazing places, accomplished some cool things, eaten some weird food, and met some interesting people. Compared to my day to day life though, all of those things pale in importance.

I am not about to start filling my life with additional goals that serve no purpose besides spending what ever time and disposable income I have left. Having reached this amazing point in my life, I am asking myself what it is all for. What is the purpose of all of this?

I have been lightly reading philosophy, especially Stoicism, and I am well versed in Christian thought. I have read and toyed with atheism. I have had the briefest introduction to eastern religion and philosophy, though what I have learned appears interesting. Though they appear to have much in common, they approach the goal of life in different ways.

A brief overview seems to produce one of five possible answers to my quest.

1. Asking 'What is the purpose of life?' is a false question. It is like asking 'what is the scent of blue?' It sounds like a question grammatically, but logically it is senseless. There is no purpose. Despite our advances in technology, "the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short."
2. The key purpose in life is to enrich and protect those things that are important to me. It is to find out what I love and am passionate about, and experience as much of that as possible. Find and embrace beauty and pleasure, avoid pain.
3. Make myself a better person, aiming at the excellence that I was born with. Learn more, get stronger, think more clearly. Study, exercise, write, produce beautiful things for the sheer joy of it.
4. Be useful. Make this world a better place for having been in it. Give my children what I didn't have. Help the poor. Work towards social justice.
5. Prepare myself for the world to come, for my next life, for the hereafter. Cleanse myself of sin/illusion/karma to join with the divine. Get my soul ready for the next great adventure, after I die. 

I will explore these five approaches to finding meaning in my life, likely with frequent sidebars into other topics as they present themselves.

On the Meaning of Death

This morning, on my way to work, driving down Sussex, I noticed a memorial that had been erected outside the Lester B. Pearson building. From the brief glance I got of it, it was a multi-speed bicycle, completely spray-painted a mat white. This was tied to a lamp-post, along with a large wreath, some ribbons etc. This was the site where an STO driver hit and killed a cyclist. It seemed to be a remembrance of this woman's death. I know no other details of this person's life, and not many seem to have been handed out. By contrast, I recalled another death, that of a young girl struck by a drunk driver, who was also cycling. The outrage poured out as a result of this tragedy was focused on making this girl the poster child against drunk driving. The father of this young girl was quoted as saying that, by contrast, he didn't want his daughter's life defined by the moment or method of her death, but rather, that her life be measured by her accomplishments and her potential.

As a Stoic, I was reminded that death is not an evil thing, whether it is a sudden, 'un-natural' death, like these two were victims of, or one that come after a long life. It isn't death that makes a life worthwhile, but the life that led up to it. The moment by moment, choice by choice building of our lives, the victories and losses, the valiant stands and courageous retreats, these are what make a life. Not the death.

So many have said "I would die for this," as if it would make their commitment meaningful. Better to say, "I will live for this," and bend all of your will and energies to it. Then, when death comes, your life will have been lived, and you will have fulfilled the promise you were born to.

There is work and then there is work

I have been wondering lately what it is that I am working at. I have my job of course, which is vitally important to our survival. It provides the resources that support our life and lifestyle. And to do so, it requires my attention and effort. So work is, well, work, a job, a series of consecutive tasks.

But then there is my work. What am I all about? What, besides merely struggling to stay alive, is my work. The Stoics were big fans of differentiating between those things that all animals do, and what sets us apart as a species. The fact of working to feed, shelter and clothe myself and my family doesn't really separate me from the cats, etc. They do the same.

Now the Stoics believe that two things made us distinct from other animals. We are able to reason at higher levels. We are also able to act virtuously to protect and provide for the entire species, to go beyond the family or tribe, and make global differences.

If we are able to combine the two types of work, that which causes us to survive at an individual level, and that which enhances the species, we are well placed. In some small way, most of us do qualify for that, if you follow the rabbit down the hole far enough. But for myself, I know that I want my impact, my contribution to society and the species, to be direct. I want to know that something I have done has made a concrete contribution.

But the brutal truth of it is, that I am just one fairly average man (given the context I am in) so I really can't expect to set the world afire. Perhaps that is why I try to find smaller ponds, in which I can act as a bigger fish, not in the predatory sense, but as a contributor. If I can make a bigger difference in a smaller group, will that satisfy my ego?

Perhaps that is all that it is. Ego, a desire for self-aggrandizement, to be a legend in my own time. Is it because I want to KNOW that I am important, that I need for the people around me to tell me that I matter? Maybe it is because I know that I am merely one of over 6 billion people, a small cog in a massive machine. And the machine grinds on into eternity, occasionally throwing up one of it's parts as a peak of achievement. But as Marcus says, when we are dead we are forgotten by the vast majority of people, and soon even those who remember us are dead and forgotten as well. And not long after that, cosmically speaking, even the energy and particles that made up our existence have been recycled to make other creatures and people and plants. We are litterally dust in the wind.

But that is the point. The thing we must, I must, understand. It is foolish and irrational to wish that I am other than I am. I am a cog in a six billion piece machine. I am going to die, and within a few hundred years, I will be completely forgotten. My ego rails against this, screams for fame and immortality. But my rational mind looks on. If I am to be a cog, I will be the best damned cog I can be. I will do the work that falls within my reach to the best of my ability. I will strive to be human. And that is my real work.