Reflecting on the meaning of life
“The meaning of life is that it stops. Only the moment counts. It determines life.”
- Franz Kafka
Is it that simple? One of the positive things about reflecting on and building comfort with the inevitability of death is that we can feel a renewed appreciation for each day and the important people in our lives. Thinking about death can have a meaningful impact not just on how we die, but on how we live. And through confronting death, people often figure out, if not the singular meaning of life, what really matters after all.
Palliative medicine physician, author, and speaker BJ Miller says thinking about death helps us “live life to the fullest.” Miller reflects on some of the things that matter most to people at the end of life in his popular TED talk. And as we get closer to endings, we can get closer to what really matters.
This concept is also core to Buddhist teachings that recognize death is inevitable and part of our lives. Buddhists advise daily reflection on our mortality as a way to focus on the meaning and opportunity of each moment throughout our lives. To assist with this reflection, the app We Croak aims to remind you of your mortality 5 times a day and the 4K Weeks calendar visually counts down the expected weeks left so you can prioritize how you want to spend your time.
Social worker, psychotherapist and writer Linda Hochstetler runs popular Death Cafes in downtown Toronto and is a proponent of Buddhist philosophies around death and dying as they encourage reflection on the thoughts, feelings, and sensations that arise when contemplating death. She hopes if we can make younger people more comfortable with their mortality, families can “make good decisions for good living,” and good dying.
The meaning of life is obviously a deeply personal question shaped by our individual experiences, values, and beliefs. Some people find meaning in their families and friendships, some in career and achievement, others in nature, art, literature, or advocacy and community work.
So why do we live? Are we here to each realize one's potential and ideals? To evolve, or to achieve biological perfection? To seek wisdom and knowledge? To do good and help others?
Philosophers, religious leaders, and scientists have pondered about the meaning of life for centuries. Some perspectives include:
From a scientific perspective, the meaning of life may be seen as a product of evolution where living organisms are driven by the innate desire to survive and reproduce.
Philosophers have proposed many different ideas about the meaning of life, including the pursuit of happiness, the search for wisdom and knowledge, and the desire to leave a positive impact on the world.
Different religions have their own beliefs about the meaning of life, which often center around the idea of fulfilling a purpose or destiny set forth by a higher power.
Psychologists Frank Martela and Michael F. Steger defined three dimensions to assess meaning in your life:
Coherence: How the events in a life fit together and things happen for a reason.
Purpose: A personal mission statement resulting in goals and aims. The belief that we are alive in order to “do something.”
Significance: Life’s inherent value. The sense that your life matters and has inherent value.
Without any concrete evidence as to what comes next after this life, we lean on our beliefs and hope to make peace with the end. There are many incredible books like Tuesdays with Morrie that reflect on the big lessons of life, many of these reflections coming when confronting death.
In his book, The Five Invitations, Frank Ostaseski highlights 5 lessons that have served as reliable guides for coping with death but he says are equally relevant for living a life with integrity:
Don’t wait
Welcome everything, push away nothing
Bring your whole self to the experience
Find a place of rest in the middle of things
Cultivate the “don’t know” mind
Recently, there has also been more investigation into the benefit of psychedelics in helping people reflect on life and confront death.
However you access it, helping focusing on what means most in life is one of the positive outcomes of reflecting on mortality.
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