life Options

[martin]

the meaning of life,,, what is it, why are we living, as individuals, as a species, as a global community.
is it simply survival and continuence of life, natures response to an acceptable environment, is it divine and spiritual, a stage in the cycle that is our being, is it meaningless, subject to the whims of imagination and circumstance???? anyone?

[bluebear]

no, I understood you, but I still maintain that aiming for happiness is a mistake that will lead to emptiness and self-disgust. We learn from experience, and thankfully, we can learn from other people's experiences too. But it has been my experience that aiming for happiness is misguided. Instead of specifically aiming for anything like happiness, why not simply engage in meaningful activity in the HERE and NOW? Self-less action is often meaningful, for example. Happiness will be yours, but in general, you should not aim for it, but instead focus on meaning. Our actions, perceptions, interpretations, and associations are all sources of meaning. In the end, meaning is something we create ourselves. If your life lacks meaning, then create some. Also, maybe investigating other sources (mental or physical fatigue, stress, boredom, etc..) would be useful for determining influences that may be dampening the meaning that you otherwise would experience.

[Tone]

no, I understood you, but I still maintain that aiming for happiness is a mistake that will lead to emptiness and self-disgust.

Because all the aims are wrong and its biologically rooted. If person X experiences a sublime state of happiness (State X) for just 5 minutes as a fleeting peak experience, Hypothetically, person X can be in that state of consciousness 24/7/365 if all the internal factors which produced that state + all the external factors be sufficent to allow it to continue were reproduced and maintained constantly. Also whos to say that state X cant be farther improved upon. We see increasing evidence that the hardware (brain) will do whatever its designed to do. produce whatever state its inner workings can produce.