meaning/purpose/justification
attempt #1
Perhaps the purpose for which I was born is not to write about my life - on paper, privately or on the web, publicly - in an endless search for some elusive universal meaning. That one piece of the puzzle that may help me to understand my life. Or help those who care to understand me. I have to admit, in my more egomaniacal moments, I've even thought I could help others with their own puzzle. It is a mission I have by turns embraced and denied.
Instead of striving to make even the tiniest mark on the world or on myself, perhaps I should consider the possibility that the sole purpose for which I was born was to amuse the Munchkin. To save her from a life of abuse and provide her with a sense of security. To be not her master, but her loving sister. To ensure that the silent and monochromatic world she lives in is as safe and wonderful as it can possibly be. To make her strange and difficult life as easy, as full of delight and as comfortable as one could wish.
Perhaps....
That, I think, would constitute a purpose as meaningful to me as most and more noble than some.
It is a door that must be opened so that the view therein can be carefully considered.
meaning/purpose/justification
attempt #2
I've been playing with the question of whether what we become / what we are has anything to do with nature or nurture. Are we born knowing? Is it up to our parents to direct us? The world around us? Our experiences? Force of will? Do our names show us the way through life, if only we were to listen? This is part one of that.
Where the Fire Lives
Standing still, like a pet dog told to stay; without iniative, without the impetus to move - it was as if she were waiting, marking time - body and mind - for the one big thing, the changing moment.But that was absurd, wasn't it? You could spend your life waiting for your life to change. Waste your life: but it felt like a waste already, didn't it? Be honest: didn't it?
Settling for less, and then less than that with knowledge, like a shard that slowly became sharper over time, pressing against the shrinking skin of her. Pressing like the glass in a broken mirror that shows her for what she is: not unfilled, but empty. Had her life so far felt like so little, was that what was so wrong?
I want more. She wanted to say that. I want more, but what she meant had no words, it was not some adolescent wish for excitement or thrills but the heavy hunger inside her. The part of her that knew without a doubt that what was best in her was dying. Dying here in the daylight, this space inside her, this lack.
As if her whole life had been nothing but a struggle to find - not the door - but what lives behind it, where the fire lives; not even how to get in, just to find where to get in, does that make sense?
No?
To you it wouldn't, would it? You know where your room is, you didn't even need to look for it - you were born in it.
meaning/purpose/justification
attempt #3
Part three falls under the 'do our names direct us, if only we're willing to listen?' category. Considering this is one of the symbols tattoed on my arm and I spent a lot of time researching it, I've never really given it the thought it is due.Taken from here, Alan Watts and some other place I never noted.....
Perhaps the most important Confucian and by extension Chinese value is jen. As a crucial concept the word is immensely complex and so can't be translated easily into English; traditionally, it is translated either as "humaneness" or "humanity" or "benevolence." jen as "benevolence" is a fairly good translation, since the imperative of jen is to be concerned for the well-being of others.
Principally, jen consists of shu and chung, "reciprocity or self-analogy" and "doing one's best." In the first instance, one should use oneself as an analogy when attempting to determine what is owed to others or what is beneficial to others: what you wish done for yourself, you should do for others, what you do not wish done for yourself, you should not do to others. But knowing this isn't enough; you should exert yourself to the best of your abilities (chung) to accomplish what you owe to othersthis doesn't mean that you'll succeed: it is sufficient to have the right intent and make the right effort in order to have the quality of jen.
jen is something one learns rather than something one is born with. One learns morality by listening to moral precepts (hseh) and by thinking through them in order to determine if they are applicable to the situation you find yourself in (ssu); the key to morality in Confucius is always thinking since the world is constantly changing.
Through Confucius' eyes, jen held a different sort of meaning. It was said to mean humanity or human-heartedness as well as love, benevolence, and perfect virtue. jen is one of the four most important virtues that Confucius identified. He said that these virtues could be compared to the four limbs of our body. It (jen) is natural to everything we do and that if we seek to find it and use it, this virtue will naturally occur in our actions - like our limbs working without verbally expressing how they should work. This concept of jen is said to have been the "hub of one's nature". In other words, it is considered the center throughout which all other virtues grow. In order for this to happen, people must recognize it within them (for all people have it present within them if they choose to use it) and "cultivate it like a seed". jen must be worked with and cared for in order for it to be available. Compassion is the origin and if people choose not to follow this, the natural goodness in their heart will be lost and dishonest ways of gratifying desires will be used. jen is immediately at hand if it is desired. It is said to be "central to the ideal life".
A man of true virtue is therefore a human-hearted man, and the meaning of this is that one should, above all, trust human nature in the full recognition that it is both good and bad, that it is both loving and selfish.
'The Tao of Philosophy'
Alan Watts
reflection
I guess this could be included in the meaning/purpose/justification series. Anyways, it's an excerpt from a book I bought in Winnipeg last November called "The Meaning of Things, Applying Philosophy to Life" by A.C. Grayling. A.C. Grayling is Reader in Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London.Perseverance
Courage and hope both depend on a crucial virtue: perseverance, the ability to keep going in adverse circumstances - with a cheerful countenance if possible, but if not, then at least in the spirit of Seneca's world-weary observation, 'Even after a bad harvest there must be sowing.'It is said that perseverance is a good trait except when applied to inappropriate aims. This places the emphasis on knowing when aims are the right ones. Someone might say that the tone-deaf, lump-fingered man who persists in his endeavours to play the violin is obviously on the wrong tack, and it does not help to praise him for persevering. But someone else might reply that any worthy aim, such as playing the violin, dignifies the struggle to achieve it, and however difficult it might be for such a man to learn to play, he has still gained much from trying.
This is an encouraging reply. Arguably, most of us could do most of what we desire - or at least, like the aspiring violinist, could gain a great deal from trying - if we found the right way to approach it. Some techniques suit some people, others suit others; one has to find the method best adapted to oneself.
One of John F. Kennedy's speech-writers left a fingerprint on history in 1961 with the brilliant remark that America was going to put a man on the moon by the end of that decade not because it was an easy thing to do, but because it was a hard thing to do; and doing hard things is what makes you better.
Anything that requires perseverance is a hard thing in the meaning of this saying, and therefore improves you. The secret to persevering is an understanding of the 'learning curve', a graph with a line that rises, then dips somewhat, only to rise higher,- and so on, rising then dipping then rising again, continuously to the top of the page. It represents the standard shape of the progress people make in mastering anything new. All goes swimmingly; then suddenly one seems to regress, to lose what advance has been made. At this point most people give up. But if they were to persist they would find that each dip is followed by a higher rise, and the overall pattern is upward and onward, making true the Latin motto, Per ardua ad astra (through adversity to the stars).
It is a commonplace that perseverance tends to be more successful than violence - dripping water wears the stone that could not be hammered to pieces. It suggests a number of further traits in anyone who perseveres: determination, ambition, strength of resolve. The cynic would say that we should frequently substitute 'obstinacy;, 'folly' and 'blindness' respectively. The opposite of perseverance is giving up, trying something else, abandoning ambitions. Let it be conceded that if the ambition was to join the Shuttle crew, the decision was probably wise, but generally speaking the best and most satisfying choice is to see things through. As Ruskin said, it is not what we get but what we become by our endeavours that makes them worthwhile.
So, the last two years have been, for me, about perseverance. And I have learned many valuable things. Among them, the things I am willing to sacrifice and the things I'm not. Some of those things have come as a shock to those who know me. I've been told how stupid I am more times than I can count.
But, hey, you guys, you don't have to look into the same mirror that I do in the morning. And the person that looks in my mirror every morning has things that you don't have, things that you put me down for wanting. And maybe they're things you don't need. But I'm not you. The job I've always wanted. My own home. The knowledge that I really don't have to do the things I don't want to. That I can walk away from the bad people and things in my life, without looking back. That I can survive a serious illness relying only on my own strength and weather the fallout that follows. That my choices for relationships are different from yours, but that that doesn't make either of us wrong, only different. I understand that, do you?
The understanding that my expectations aren't too high, because the only people who say that are the people who want to treat others like crap and blame their actions on everyone but themselves. That sometimes, people you don't know are more important than the people you do. That people you may never meet are still important relationships worth nurturing and effort. That sometimes, the people who have known you for years want only that you stay the same person they want you to be, instead of recognizing who you are now, and sometimes, those people aren't worth any effort at all.
I learned to take responsibility, real internal responsibility for my actions. Not all the time but more often than not. I make the right choice, instead of making the wrong one, more often than I used to. And even the wrong ones, I stand by.
And 2004 will be more of the same. So, get out of the road if you don't want to get mowed down. Cause the best way to play chicken is to tear out the steering wheel and slam your foot down on the gas.
meaning/purpose/justification
attempt #5
I had this written down somewhere in my many books of stuff, I'm not sure where it came from.I don't believe the meaning of life is a puzzle that has to be solved.
Life is. I am. Anything might happen.
And I believe I may invest life with meaning.
The uncertainty is a blessing in disguise.
If I were absolutely certain about all things, I would spend my life in anxious misery, fearful of losing my way. But since everything and anything are always possible, the miraculous is always nearby and wonders shall never, ever cease.
I believe that human freedom may be stated in one term, which serves as a little brick propping open the door of existence.
And that one word is... maybe.