I can’t claim to know the answer to the age-old question: “What’s the meaning of life?” I have thoughts and possibilities. But ultimately, I sure don’t know!
But a little bit easier question might be “What makes for a meaningful, fulfilling life?”
Many years ago, a group of friends and I decided to take turns telling our life stories, 45 minutes for each person. It was interesting to see what people decided was important enough from their 20-something years of life to fit into the limited 45 minutes that they had to share.
I noticed that day that, without exception, everything everyone chose to share seemed to fit into one of two categories: looking for a sense of purpose or looking for a sense of belonging.
What is a “Sense of Purpose”?
Everything everyone shared had to do with finding a sense of purpose – what they enjoyed learning about in school, what they studied in college, jobs they loved or hated, issues they were passionate about in the world, hobbies that filled them up, how they wanted to make a difference, how their spiritual or religious beliefs evolved, what made them feel successful and accomplished and proud (or not!).
What is a “Sense of Belonging”?
Or, what each person shared had to do with finding a sense of belonging – what their family was like, who their childhood friends were, that time when someone moved away, when they were hurt by someone, when they didn’t have any close friends, new communities they found, times they felt they could really be themselves, when they were truly vulnerable and fully known, romantic relationships they had, loved ones they lost.
Why are these so important?
I don’t know why. But they are!
We want to matter.
We are hard-wired for relationships. We are hard-wired for connection, even the most introverted among us.
As different as we all are, we all seem to have the same basic desires and needs: a sense of purpose and a sense of belonging (and I’ll throw a 3rd one in there: a sense of self-love). Over the last 15 years since developing this framework, I have come across so many therapists, social workers, psychologists, and educators all saying about the same thing, just with slightly different language.
So What?
So if something is off in our lives – we’re not as eager to get out of bed, we don’t smile as easily as we once did, we’re more irritable, we’re less hopeful and optimistic, we’re more critical or cynical about people, etc. – it may just be because we are tired or stressed.
But oftentimes, if we look hard enough, we find that 1 or more of those 3 basic needs aren’t being met as fully as they need to be. Something’s off. We’re not feeling as much of a sense of purpose, sense of belonging, or sense of self-love as we need.
This isn’t always a framework we bring into therapy, but sometimes it can be a helpful framework for understanding what’s missing or what might need to change. Having a framework can provide some direction and bring the feeling that this problem is manageable, rather than feeling lost and adrift.
So take a few minutes to check in with yourself:
How’s my sense of purpose these days?
How’s my feeling of belonging and connection?
How am I doing with self-love?
And if one or more of those isn’t where you want it to be, that’s ok!. We’re human! We don’t usually (ever?) have it all together! But that awareness is the first step. And having that framework can help you begin to know what area(s) of life you might need to shore up so that you can begin to feel less anxious and more confident, less depressed and more joyful, less empty and more fulfilled.
And even if we still might not have a perfect answer to “What’s the meaning of life?”, we will have a much better sense of what makes life feel meaningful and fulfilling!