The real meaning of life

"I was sitting with my laptop at a cafe in New York City trying to avoid writing a paper for my first year humanities class. In a moment of despair, I typed 'What is the meaning of life?' into an online forum. Fifty thousand hits and two thousand answers later..."

writes David Seaman on the cover of his book, "The Real Meaning of Life." A friend gave me Seaman's collection of thoughtful answers from everyday people recently ($3, used, on good authority).

As I began to read through them in five- and ten-minute bites, I was surprised to find a thread running through nearly all of the responses. I wonder if it may be a deep human warp, tip-toeing the line between generalities that skirt meaninglessness, and observations so widely shared that they suggest a drop of transcendent truth. They may seem obvious but, like the Golden Rule, can effect a transformation in one's living when taken seriously.

Life is good. And its corollary, don't be afraid! If not stated outright, these thoughts often appear in variations of the phrase, "the purpose of life is to live." It's a vision of life as an ongoing play of possibilities and experiences, in which simple existence or be-ing are good in themselves. My inner existentialist would strip the rich statement "life is good" down to "human individuals have a selfish, unfounded preference for their own existence over non-existence," but even nihilistic Aleesha on page 35 and "We're only here to reproduce" Doug on page six agree that at its heart, life is good. Now what?

Make it better. Life's goodness implies the possibility for different kinds of goodness! Consistently we respond to the life we see around us with the desire to make it better through design and nurture, work and creativity. Making life more beautiful, more just, more peaceful, or even simply new and different. "Better" is not the same as "perfect," and it comes in all shapes and sizes. Darice dreams big dreams for indigenous peoples on page 149, while Katy sticks with "Do your best" and "Forgive" (209). The desire to make life better seems to grow outward from an individual's perspective to include more and more others in life's goodness.

Many of the responses in Seaman's book describe humanity's ultimate separateness or oneness. I don't know quite what to make of the authors who are utterly convinced of the truth of their favored outlook that "we are all one" or "we are all alone." I feel a kind of yin-and-yang or true paradox here, understanding both real connection with others and real boundaries in relationships. From the bubble of my own experience, I can bump up with other bubbles and still share something real and meaningful.

I'm amazed and encouraged by the people who write that life has "no meaning," and proceed to describe the meaning that they've found in their lives. Most who say that life is meaningless live like at least their own life is good, and from there it's a short hop to discovering that others' lives are also good. Even those who claim life means "whatever you want it to mean" almost always affirm that life is good, and respond by trying making it better. We all seem to want that hope and calling.

Looking back, I notice that I haven't mentioned love. Many of the responses in Seaman's collection do. Maybe love is the way that this conviction ("life is good") and its response ("make it better") are made concrete in an individual's life and how they relate to others. I've lived my life in a faith tradition that supports me in asking big questions like Seaman's "What is the meaning of life?" Our search for truth leads us to the asking, the answering, and the asking again.

It's hard to sum up, but I like the realism and cautious hope of Jim Gossens' answer on page 146; "Life sucks - but it's a little more interesting than the alternative."