Money is not the fuel to power this engine called life. Only meaning is. Meaning will get you the abundance you need, the life you want, the pleasures you crave.
To have meaning in your life is better than to have what you want, because you may neither know what you want, nor what you truly need…
Meaning signifies that you are in the right place, at the right time, properly balanced between order and chaos, where everything lines up as best it can at that moment.
If you think that you will discover meaning and purpose or you will “find yourself” by traveling to some exotic place, stop thinking those thoughts right now. While I am a fan of traveling, the only thing that really changes when you travel is your location. The problems you had when you left are waiting for you when you arrive.
The only real way to find meaning and fulfillment in your life is by obtaining self respect through responsibility and accountability.
Like Dr. Peterson says- we have to find the right balance between order and chaos where we’re competent enough but also challenged enough. When we fall to either side, we don’t find any meaning or fulfillment.
America is great because she is good. The goodness of her citizens is what makes her great. My fear is that we have forgotten how to be good. Many of us have forgotten what good even is.
...devote yourself to creating something that gives you purpose and meaning.
The world has shrunk since the advent of the smartphone. The women of Tokyo dress the same as the women in Paris dress the same as the women in New York. We scroll and scroll through our individualized content streams, but we’ll never reach the end; in this atomization of experience, it is hard to see the collective point of it all.
A man who becomes conscious of the responsibility he bears toward a human being who affectionately waits for him, or to an unfinished work, will never be able to throw away his life. He knows the "why" for his existence, and will be able to bear almost any "how".
One should not search for an abstract meaning of life. Everyone has his own specific vocation or mission in life to carry out a concrete assignment which demands fulfillment. Therein he cannot be replaced, nor can his life be repeated. Thus, everyone's task is as unique as is his specific opportunity to fulfill it
What matters therefore is not the meaning of life in general but rather the specific meaning of a person's life at a given moment.
Ultimately man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather he must recognize that it is he who is asked. In a word, each man is questioned by life; and he can only answer to life by answering for his own life.
In some way, suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning in a sacrifice.
Once an individual's search for meaning is successful, it not only renders him happy but also gives him the capability to cope with suffering.
As to the causation of the feeling of meaninglessness, one may say, albeit in an oversimplifying vein, that people have enough to live by but nothing to live for; they have the means but no meaning.
Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.
Money is not the fuel to power this engine called life. Only meaning is. Meaning will get you the abundance you need, the life you want, the pleasures you crave.