One night I went to a coffee shop, sat outside, and started to write. A sudden thought jolted me: what is the point of this? By this I refer to me going to this coffee shop on a Monday evening and writing; in a larger what is the meaning of life type of way. Then realized very clearly that there was indeed a purpose or meaning to the particular act of me coming to this coffee shop and writing on this particular night: at some point prior to taking the action I had decided I wanted to go to a place I enjoy and write for a while.
Yes, a bit of a tautology, but nevertheless true: when you write, the point to the act of writing is very clear. You want to put pen to paper at that particular moment. Same holds true for any, actually, every single action we take each and every day if viewed in context: picking up the coffee cup and taking a drink has a very definite purpose or meaning: to drink the coffee. Not glamorous but factual nonetheless: action implies meaning or purpose, as if the meaning is contained within the act itself. Every single action is meaningful and with purpose if viewed in isolation, as a particular act at a particular moment. Pick any action you take, have taken, or will take and you will realize there is a point to that particular action in-itself at a given moment in time.
So then why does the question, a question which engenders much angst, what is the point of this, arise? The problem, and it is a very serious problem, occurred, I realized, when I tried to connect a particular act at a given moment, which in itself, as one particular action I was taking (writing at a coffee shop) undoubtedly had meaning and purpose, to the general question of the purpose of it all, the meaning of it all. If every single action we take every single day, in itself, has purpose, can I say that my life as a whole has purpose? If the former statement is true, does the latter question even matter? In other words, is it possible that the reason human beings struggle with the question of the meaning of it all, life, the universe, whatever, is that we are seeking to know something which does not exist outside of our own minds?
Allow me to explain. Now, there can be no doubt that each particular act anyone takes at any given moment has a purpose, an end. But, the temptation is to seek a vantage point or conceptual framework from which all these particular acts will be given meaning by a larger whole (as opposed to accepting the context within which they are valid, mundane as that may be). However, we are already part of a real larger world that, in each particular case, has meaning without the need to refer to the whole to give it meaning (I’m typing right now; there is a point to that; I want to write a blog; simple and boring, but true).
On the night I initially had these thoughts for example, there were plenty of other people in the coffee shop (the larger whole), each taking particular actions every moment, each action having a definite purpose and meaning within the particular moment it was taken. But if I were to ask, what was the meaning of it all, of all those people being there tonight doing whatever they were each doing, I would run into an absolute dead end and would have to admit there was no meaning to it all or that it was all part of God’s plan and leave it at that; which means I accept it as it is, as it was, and don’t try to go further. But, does the larger whole really exist as I pictured it, or as I think of it when I ask the question or is it just within my own mind? There is no doubt that the larger whole exists in reality: there was a coffee shop I went to one night and there were plenty of people there each doing their particular thing, each particular action having a definite purpose at the moment it was taken.
However, the coffee shop as a larger unit as I think of it when I ask the question, what is the overall meaning of all this, does not exist. And hence, my utter inability to answer the question. Nihilism is one option. Another is faith in things as they are. It seems to me there is never a time in anyone’s life where that particular thing he or she is doing at that particular moment does not have a definite meaning or purpose or point. Moreover, there can be no doubt that each of us is part of a larger whole that really exists where, for each person, the particular things they do each and every day are meaningful; they have a purpose; people eat because they are hungry. It’s funny: there is never a moment without meaning or purpose when the situation is examined from this angle. But the larger whole does not exist in the manner in which we think of it when we ask, what is the point of all this. The larger whole exists as it is, not as we think about it. Therefore, if any person attempts to correlate their particular, individual actions to a larger whole (their whole life, society, the universe, whatever) they will fail to find the meaning they are looking for because the whole they are referring to when they ask the question is a creation of their own mind. Again, this is not to say a whole does not exist. Nor that there is not an ultimate meaning. Quite the contrary. Rather, the whole and the ultimate meaning that a person is thinking about when they ask the questions do not exist. And hence we obtain a null result. But, the meaning of it all is always right there in front of us as it is (not as we would like it to be). Each individual has a choice: admit there is no meaning to it all or accept things as they are.
Or I guess you could keep on looking for the answer.
