“When you find more meaning in life, you become more contented, whereas if you don’t have a purpose in life and are searching for it unsuccessfully, you will feel much more stressed out.” According to Dilip V. Jeste, MD, Professor of Psychiatry and Neurosciences at UC San Diego School of Medicine, the reasons we live and work are fundamental to our quality of life.
Since the beginning of humankind, the quest to find meaning and purpose, has been manipulated, misguided, deluded, and used to accomplish much along humankind’s spectrum, from the greatest acts of humanity right down to the darkest moments in history. Politicians, educators, orators, and religion itself has used the universal search for meaning to manipulate people to further their own agendas. The failure of these greedy motivations has caused needless stress while we seek to find meaning ourselves.
Many find themselves so caught up in the business of life and ambitious pursuits towards “a better life for themselves and their children” that they do not get a chance to even ask the question, “What is my Life for?” They mistakenly seek answers of the material world. Nor can I tell you what your life is for, for truly the integrity of the question comes from deep within us. Therefore, I will try to tell you a few of my own personal thoughts on the matter in the hope of pointing toward a Source who can help you answer it for yourself.
If I define “Life” as the period of time elapsing between my physical birth and death on this earth, and if I define “better” as bigger, more money, more power, and more stuff, (like I used to) then I will never find the “better life”. Most of us know this, most of us say we understand it, yet our lives – and the choices we make—have as much to do with ‘stuff’ as anything else. Our striving for this “better life” motivates us but it actually functions more like a carrot on the end of stick, always just beyond our grasp. I in no way wish to pass judgement on those who sincerely strive for these things, thinking that through them they will be satisfied. The world’s systems have taught them that “happiness” lies just over this mountain. They are only doing the best they know to do.
They are only doing the best they know to do.
I personally came to a place where I realized my pursuit of this “better life” directly and inextricably contributed to a terrible and dark war waged against mankind: a war that steals from others; a war that leaves them to struggle for the basic necessities of life; a war that perpetuates this illusion that if one works hard, they can have anything they want. I saw how my gain was at another’s expense, and how I had learned not to care. I saw how this economic/political/environmental injustice was at the root of all war and conflict and I, no matter my intention, was partially responsible. It deeply saddened me, and convinced me that there must be another way.
In my new understanding of “Life” as part of a much larger experience and greater expression of who I actually was created to be, the words “having” and “doing” are replaced by words like “becoming”, “being”, and “growing” as part of an ongoing, never-ending process of Creation. “Life”, then, is something deep within my soul, something eternal, something outside of time and even material space as we know it; it is not privately defined but it is seen as a stream that I enter into, with currents, rapids, and a huge collecting system of all of creation, all galaxies, and all universes, both visible and invisible. This definition of life teaches me that the things I have, I must hold loosely because they are not mine but part of all. It also teaches me that I must become awakened to what is real and eternal... and walk away from the illusion of achievement and success. However, while my responsibility and choices are personal and individual, this “Life” points me to a paradox: Though I personally choose this “Life”, I can find fulfillment only with and in direct connection with others. This is the definition of Life that I am coming to understand. I have seen glimpses of it, and I long for more.
Along this way, I saw Jesus differently from what theologians and teachers describe. From a young age, I was taught that my reason for living was to obey and believe God. If I did this, my reward would be eternal happiness in heaven. I was taught, too, that if I did not obey and believe, I would be punished with eternal damnation. Alternatively, if I were not too bad, I would suffer a portion of eternity in torture until I had paid for my sins. I was taught that the Bible is a book of rules that defined the boundaries of my actions and thoughts, and that Jesus came to appease my angry heavenly Father by dying in my place so I could be forgiven and not go to hell as I deserved, and where our heavenly Father was planning to send me. My ultimate motivator was fear and worry about where I would spend eternity. I could go on, but I think you get the picture.
The real Jesus that aligned with the one who first came to me, began to take shape through my seeking for real meaning and purpose. This Jesus is creating in me a completely different worldview and perspective from which I view my personal life and the lives of every human being. As I re-center my life on the development of my soul and my responsibility to become part of spiritual truth, spiritual reality, and spiritual experience from an eternal perspective, I see all people within this context. The search for the true self, the recognition of the ego, the illusion of this world based on fear, the struggle to become a person who is aware of his thoughts and actions, and the pursuit to become someone who can point to another Way, now brings Jesus into focus. Jesus did not come to earth as a conqueror nor dictator, not as a spiritual policeman nor as a prophet of doom, and not as a lawgiver nor a judge. Jesus comes to us as our Creator, our Brother, and our Savior who points us to a completely new Way and new Life of genuine Love. When I am born again, I can differentiate between flesh and spirit, between illusion and reality, and between old paradigms and a radically different Way. My motivation for change now is my “becoming”. I have chances to point to a Way of Life not incentivized by “greatness” or the need for coveting, acquiring, protecting, and increasing possessions. Instead of planting seeds of war through materialism, I can imagine a world where, to quote the chorus of a song, “No man is an island, no man stands alone, each man’s joy is joy to me, each man’s tears are my own.” This no longer seems impossible to me, for my part is simply to love all as God loves all.
My part is simply to love all as God loves all.
This hope honors God the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit, for they come to us, not to conquer, but to invite all. What is my incentive for Life? To become all that I was sent here by God to become what God intended me to be on this earth. “Greater things than these you will do…” “That all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you”. This is what I know my life is for and I need you to help me find it.
A question like this calls for at least a small smattering of things Jesus said. Consider these words from HIS perspective:
from Matthew 6:
“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
“The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!
“No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?
“And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
Luke 12: Then he said to them, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.”
John 11:25-26: Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?”
John 14:27: Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.
Romans 8:38-39: For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
