A caveat against the whole “pick something to pursue, attain it, then pick something else” approach: That’s very the Ayn Randian, but I’d argue her approach ignores the bigger question, which is <i>how</i> you pick what to pursue. Search your life for “themes of dissatisfaction” – what sorts of incidents trigger dissatisfaction in you – and figure out how you can change yourself or the world to make things better. That’s the only way to guarantee your long “struggle for objective attainment” will be worthwhile.
In other words, becoming a member of HIM.
The meaning of life is…
wait for it…
Anything you want it to be!
The meaning of life is to get a really high post count on this message board
[A caveat against the whole “pick something to pursue, attain it, then pick something else” approach: That’s very the Ayn Randian, but I’d argue her approach ignores the bigger question, which is how you pick what to pursue. Search your life for “themes of dissatisfaction” – what sorts of incidents trigger dissatisfaction in you – and figure out how you can change yourself or the world to make things better. That’s the only way to guarantee your long “struggle for objective attainment” will be worthwhile.
I agree my approach ignores the “how”, but the “how” is pointless. We are what we are, and need what we need. In the words of Dostoyevsky (paraphrase):
“All men live in cages. Some can see the bars. Others can’t. That’s the only difference.”
Truth is, there’s no point in worrying about why you want what you want. Because if you want it, there’s nothing you can do to stop yourself from wanting it, is there?
You don’t pick what you want. Its just given to you.
You could’ve also paraphrased that Dostoyevsky quote into “I am using unjustified comments to reconcile my quasi-fascist politics with both my early-in-life liberalism and Christian faith.” Seriously, that was pretty much him excusing himself for supporting a brutal, oppressive Czar after his conversion to Christianity (and conservativism) despite the fact that the Czar was a most un-Christian fellow and Fyodor was still a socialist deep down, as is pretty easy to tell.
Although I don’t necessarily agree with this perspective, this is what my father thinks about the meaning of life:
Reproduce so that your children can reproduce so their children can reproduce so their children… ad infinitum.
A hougnan I hang out counters that by saying: “There’s death. He tells a lotta dirty jokes. You do stuff before hearing them.” Actually, I don’t really know if that counters it at all. I don’t know what the hell he meant.
I guess that during one of his epileptic seizures he’d seen God. Or perhaps the switch was pressed when Fedia discovered how his Papa passed away. It was a happy death though – for a Russian mujik drowning in vodka is almost as delightful as dying while screwing his baba.
Da.
Oh, and wouldn’t that make someone’s life fulfilled by ending it on a happy note?
And yes, finally Dostoevsky too is dragged out into the street and shot by the thought police. Is nothing sacred? Have you no decency, Arac?
Could be worse. Arac could’ve resurrected him by way of necromancy and then literally shot him. (Which would be a pity because if an undead Dostoevsky wrote a book on modern politics, that would be fuckin’ awesome.)
Rien n’est sacré, tout peut se dire. Nothing’s sacred, everything can be said. Seems that book of Raoul Vageinem hasn’t been translated to English yet 
The Fyodor quote could also be considered from an absurdist point of view. And this firefox dictionary doesn’t include the word absurdist, wtf .
That is the meaning of life from a biological perspective, which is true. It coldly acknowledges the subjectivity of meaning and how it varies from 1 person to the next. For some, the meaning of life IS to end. For others its female ejaculation. Overall, it doesn’t matter.
The whole Ayn Rand thing is how you get meaning from life. Which is perfectly true. Xwing’s question of how people go about to get to begin with is not necessarily so relevant because that’s not something people really ever focus on. People don’t sit down and think deeply about whether or not they believe something is their purpose. In fact, most people have a general lack of purpose and their short term goals are dictated by what is a convenient follow up to the previous set of short term goals.
It is nevertheless an interesting question from an external point of view as it pertains to human nature. While at first it may not seem like it really has anything to do directly with the meaning of life, it has to do indirectly with the meaning of life because if you have a flawed way of acquiring your goals to begin with because, for example, you might be irrational or delusional or in denial about a few things, then you will meet many more difficulties. But then again, not all people are objective about how they evaluate other individuals’ goal seeking and the nature of the goal itself is subjective, which makes debating the validity of other individuals goal seeking moot. So what are we left with? The journey.
Let me elaborate on what I meant, since I don’t think it came across clearly.
Ayn Rand bypasses the traditional philosophical question of, “What am I here to do?” with an imperative, “Just do <i>something</i> and the rest will work out.”
Now, I see exactly why she did that: it’s her reaction against subjective-idealist dilly-dallying, wasting life trying to figure out what life means, changing one’s beliefs so as to be most comfortable at the moment, etc. Her solution is to pick a material objective that seems reasonably desirable, and attain it by any means necessary. She “carves a way” out of early-20th-century philosophical lethargy.
And you’re right, often the resultant “journey” is important. “Here’s what I arbitrarily chose to do; I attained it; and my <i>experiences along the way</i> made my life worthwhile.”
But it doesn’t always work out that way. I know someone who’s about 30, who spent his youth and young adulthood planning his future success in business. Sure, he had some friends, and sure, he’s married and has a great car, but I don’t think he’s <i>ever</i> known what being happy is. It’s sad to watch him age prematurely, as a result of working long hours, and for what? Increased financial security? He may die rich, but he’ll have almost nothing to look back on.
In any event, my point is that picking an objective does <i>not</i> guarantee the “journey.” You need to pick goals that allow for a satisfying lifestyle, <i>for you</i>. Unless you’re lucky, the only way to do that is to become intimately familiar with your subjective. Whether you do so through religion, continental philosophy, psychology or otherwise is a matter of personal preference. But you need <i>something</i> on which to base your choice of objective.
I agree completely.
As for why so many people get so little out of their own journeys, I’ll refer to something I said earlier: “In fact, most people have a general lack of purpose and their short term goals are dictated by what is a convenient follow up to the previous set of short term goals”.
Let me elaborate on what I meant, since I don’t think it came across clearly.
Ayn Rand bypasses the traditional philosophical question of, “What am I here to do?” with an imperative, “Just do something and the rest will work out.”
Now, I see exactly why she did that: it’s her reaction against subjective-idealist dilly-dallying, wasting life trying to figure out what life means, changing one’s beliefs so as to be most comfortable at the moment, etc. Her solution is to pick a material objective that seems reasonably desirable, and attain it by any means necessary. She “carves a way” out of early-20th-century philosophical lethargy.
And you’re right, often the resultant “journey” is important. “Here’s what I arbitrarily chose to do; I attained it; and my experiences along the way made my life worthwhile.”
But it doesn’t always work out that way. I know someone who’s about 30, who spent his youth and young adulthood planning his future success in business. Sure, he had some friends, and sure, he’s married and has a great car, but I don’t think he’s ever known what being happy is. It’s sad to watch him age prematurely, as a result of working long hours, and for what? Increased financial security? He may die rich, but he’ll have almost nothing to look back on.
In any event, my point is that picking an objective does not guarantee the “journey.” You need to pick goals that allow for a satisfying lifestyle, for you. Unless you’re lucky, the only way to do that is to become intimately familiar with your subjective. Whether you do so through religion, continental philosophy, psychology or otherwise is a matter of personal preference. But you need something on which to base your choice of objective.
Yah, I agree. People need to go after what they want to be happy. That was my point. But what I ignored, and you’ve pointed out, is that a great many people are so repressed that they don’t really know what they want. I can’t argu with that.
So my advice, to whoever made this thread, is to be honest with yourself if you want to be ‘fulfilled’. Self-knowledge is the key. But really looking at yourself, and what you really want and need, takes a lot of guts.
Hey, I like Dostoevsky. I’m just saying that that particular quote is pretty much him excusing himself for supporting a brutal dictator who was against everything Dostoevsky theoretically stood for. I mean, Christianity and murderin’ anybody who disagrees with you don’t exactly go hand-in-hand. Making a whore the most moral character of your book, or writing sympathetically of prisoners wasn’t exactly cool with most Russian conservatives, either. Anyway, I just find that the quote given here amounts to an excuse; “Well, see, it’s okay that he does this to people, because everybody’s really a prisoner anyway, it’s just these prisoners actually know they are, so, like, it’s okay that there’s not really a reason they’re in jail, since they would be anyway. See?”
A fulfilled life is defined by a life used to fulfill your obligations to the best of your abilities. Simple.