Many people ask, "What is my purpose in life?" The question itself begs another question: what do you mean by purpose? A purpose implies conscious intent. Something conscious must have created us in order for us to have a purpose. If no one created us, then there is no purpose. Since we are conscious ourselves, however, we can at the very least provide our own purpose. This purpose may or may not be in alignment with any other creator's purpose.
There are really only two options though: we give ourselves purpose or something had an intent for us and we can choose whether or not to follow that particular purpose. So let's break these down.
No Purpose But My Own?
If we have no purpose other than our own, then there is only one satisfying answer for what to do: whatever makes us feel the most fulfilled. Though simple in words, it is perhaps a lot more complicated when attempted given that most of us don't know what fulfills us. If we find ourselves magically fulfilled without giving it much thought, then congratulations! Hopefully it stays that way for you. For the rest of us, it does not come so easily. Most of us guess, flail, and hope that we become fulfilled without actually considering what a fulfilling life truly is.
So the #1 purpose when self-defined should first and foremost be to determine how one lives a fulfilling life. To do otherwise is to give our lives up to chance and likely failure. Once determined to investigate what a fulfilling life is, people will often come to wildly different beliefs. Most people will still be wrong because most people still fail to think logically and recognize the pitfalls of how our minds operate. A decent rule of thumb, however, is to determine if we're generally happy or miserable. If one is miserable, they are probably not succeeding at living a fulfilling life. If one is happy, then they are perhaps succeeding.
There is a third option, but it's really just a twist on fulfillment. The third option is to comprehend the nature of reality and select a larger mission based upon it. If, for example, we find that the nature of reality benefits those who make cheese (I don't know why—perhaps making cheese impacts our spiritual growth), then one might decide to take on the mission of teaching everyone how to make cheese. Even if exhausted and miserable, this person might still find this life fulfilling because they believe they are working for the greater good. It's still fulfillment, but perhaps not based on joy and misery. Alternatively, one might decide to make as much cheese as possible and the heck with the others.
This semi-third option, however, revolves heavily around comprehending reality itself which is fairly impossible. For any reality one could muster, it could easily be overridden with a simulation. We can find all the rules and laws and everything, but if it's all simulated, then none of it is true. And we can never prove we're not simulated nor that the creators of our simulation are not also simulated. The truth of reality can perhaps be known, but we can never truly know we know. The best we can do is make educated guesses and wagers.
Where am I going with this...? Ultimately, you do you. Pick what fulfills you. But if you don't stop to consider what actually fulfills you based upon the laws of the experienced reality, you will probably fail. In short, spend some time figuring it out. I'll give you a leg up though: lasting fulfilment is a mindset rather than an person, place, thing, or achievement. The wealthiest people diverge in happiness and fulfillment. The most successful people diverge in happiness and fulfillment. The most powerful diverge, the most famous diverge, and the most honored diverge. None of these things guarantee fulfillment. Some of the happiest and most fulfilled people have none of those things. It all comes down to one's mindset, and that cannot be explained in a simple sentence. I'd recommend starting with Your Mind is Made of Voices to comprehend how to rewire the brain. This is where fulfilment will be found.
Alternative Purposes?
So let's play around with some other theories. What would they mean? Are they logically consistent?
- Faith in God
- This could be any religion who thinks the goal is to believe in their particular God, creed, rituals, scriptures, or person. The goal is that we must believe a particular thing with our minds. How does one rectify this as a purpose? Many of these faiths believe their God to be all-powerful, all-knowing, all-everything. What use would such a God have with the meandering thoughts of the specs of its creation? Why would such a God give a shit at all? Is such a God lonely? Vain? Bored? What adjective would make this desire make any sense at all? Beyond "Mysterious Ways," I can't find much of anything that works.
I think some might say that God, being 'perfect', can't handle imperfect beings such as ourselves, but that begs the question of what 'perfect' means. Perfect in what way? Loving? Patient? Kind? Well those descriptions should be able to handle imperfect beings—especially if born of its own creation. Such a God could and should put up with us, teach us, grow us, love us, and so on. Such a perfect being could not create a one-time-use human shell with a soul whom he intends to outcast for failure of reaching perfection within a single lifetime. Such a God would almost certainly allow us infinite time to improve and find the perfect way to help us in our journey. If that's the case that such a perfect and loving God exists, we can be absolutely sure and guaranteed that this world is exactly that perfect school of sorts. We are here to learn to become worthy of the presence of God.
Now, I'd say most people of faith think it is impossible to be worthy of God. God is perfect, we are not, we can never equate, and therefore there is always a separation between us and God. That may be, sure, but what perfect being can create something that it cannot withstand the presence of? Or could otherwise create a being that cannot withstand the presence of itself? None of this is logically consistent, and chocking it up to mysterious ways is not a great answer—especially when the only reason they believe this way is because a human first told them this dynamic. They're taking man's word for what God supposedly said and did in order to conclude something that is so logically inconsistent we must throw our hands up and call it mysterious. I don't trust humans enough to do that.
If I am to believe that some perfect God exists that creates a single-use human that must believe a certain thing in order to find oneself in the presence of said God, it's going to take more than the word of man for me to believe that particular thing—especially when these beliefs in particular are correlated so strongly with the logistics of birthplace more than anything else. Each religion believes they got the right hand-me-down from humans due primarily to where they were raised. It's not a great metric for choosing between the various beliefs. The alternative is to use our own brains, but that brings us back to requiring logical consistency rather than accepting mysterious ways.
In short "Faith in God" as a purpose is a wash. It's not a logically consistent framework in any fashion. - Spiritual Growth
- As alluded to in the Faith in God option, there could be a purpose for Spiritual Growth. There are a few ways this could come about. Either some God (perfect or otherwise) made this existence for a particular purpose of growing us spiritually, or the natural development of this world makes for spiritual growth to be of utmost importance. If God is perfect, then we can assume this is the perfect setup for growth. If God is imperfect, we can probably still assume there is nothing better beyond a conceptual standard, so this is still the best we're going to get for spiritual growth. The key distinction is that it's still intentional and directed. The third option is that the natural order of things (we can still call this God if desired) makes spiritual growth the best option for one reason or another.
From here, we can only speculate. These speculations can come from various accounts and reports of others, but it's still speculation none the less. Even if we had our own encounter with the divine, there will always exist a level of speculation since any experience could be our own manufacturing or a being attempting to deceive us. Still, let's consider why spiritual growth could be a decent purpose.
For most practical perspectives, it just makes sense. If there is something beyond Earth, and earth is a place for spiritual growth, wouldn't it make sense that these locations beyond are intended to be for spiritually mature individuals? There could be layers of existence based upon one's growth. There could be various dimensions, existences, cultures, or ways of being that are separated out based solely upon our spiritual growth. If God is perfect in love and kindness and all that, then it would make sense that the growth tends toward that direction and as we improve we get ever closer to God's existence. This could either be directed and gatekept, but it could also just be a natural ordering. Like oil and water, the layers separate naturally. As we grow out of the spiritual level of this world, we simply find ourselves separated into a new level of growth. This would make spiritual growth of utmost importance so that we don't relive the pains and struggles of this particular world and we can advance to more loving ways of being. This might also just be the purpose of simulation creators and we'll get an android body if we prove we won't murder everyone in the real world.
What's great about this perspective is that it has no down sides to believe. If we focus on our own spiritual growth, there is no downside to being wrong about the purpose. As we analyze this world and what truly fulfills us (again, read Your Mind is Made of Voices) we will find that spiritual growth is exactly the thing that brings us the most joy and life fulfillment. The only question is... is there something more? - Divine Purpose
- There is one more option I can consider for why any one of us might be here. This would not be why the average person is here as it would necessarily defeat the purpose. This third option is if we, or someone else, made an intentional decision to come here for a specific purpose beyond spiritual growth or making our own purpose. Such a purpose might be to aid in the spiritual growth of others or, perhaps to instigate some particular event like birthing a new tech, insight, or development of some sort. Think prophet or the cure for cancer and the like
There's no reason to think this is impossible, and we have plenty of people and historical figures who believe or demonstrated a form of divine purpose. What is interesting, however, is how many of us seem to start with no knowledge of this divine purpose. There are a few historical accounts of people who claim to have known from early on, but the vast majority of those who believe in a divine purpose appear to have had to wake up to it. So I will clump this together with the fourth concept. - To Wake Up
- The idea that we came to Earth and forgot who or what we are is an interesting one. It begs a lot of questions. If the goal is to wake up, then why do we forget to begin with? Is it part of the nature of things? For some reason incarnation inherently requires forgetting? Is it a rule? The divine will of God? A natural consequence? Our own desire upon entering? It could all be a giant game and we have to wake up to win. Or perhaps waking up is what enables us to win. But to win what? In the case of a divine purpose, the forgetfulness seems like a setback. We have a purpose but forgetfulness clearly gets in the way of that purpose. It can't be a feature if there are divine purposes that we forget about unless the purpose isn't particularly important. If it's important and we're still required to forget, it's not so much a feature as some necessity for some reason.
If we have a divine purpose and it's actually important, then it cannot simply be the will of God, it would have to be a requirement for some reason. A natural order of things that God cannot work around. This seems to make an important divine purpose inconsistent with an all-powerful God of intention. That, or God just really likes to make it hard and we must simply shrug at the mysterious ways. So to me, this takes away the possibility that anyone has an important mission if they were inflicted with the human condition of amnesia, or else it removes a more consciously intentional concept of God. God could still exist as an all-loving consciousness, but not one that is intentionally orchestrating events. It would have to be more of a natural ordering of things. God simply is.
I tend to lean this way that God simply is and that God is a natural order of things—the outcome of natural separation of spiritual maturity. As we advance, we simply become pieces of the spiritual whole that comprises what we typically call God. In such a way, God is technically everything in the same way a glass of oil and water can be "God" but it's only worthwhile to focus on the oil that rose to the top for guidance and inspiration. Oil, of course, being the layer of spiritual maturity that rose to the top. There could still be intention of conscious beings at various levels including the very top, but this concept of God with intention must still operate within the natural laws of existence. We could then still have purpose, but must operate within limitations such as forgetfulness.
But then what would the purpose be? If the substrate of reality is layers of spiritual growth, then I could really only perceive of a purpose that focuses on that particular worldview. The purpose would be to aid in our ascension in one way or another. Or perhaps to reduce suffering, but suffering is itself a mental state lower than those of peace, safety, and love. Still the same purpose.
But what about waking up without divine purpose? Could the purpose be to wake up as a part of spiritual growth? This would seemingly imply that our state here is less than intentional. We find ourselves here on accident, by someone else's design, or via the nature of things (natural filtering) and the only way out (which is presumably a good goal) is through waking up which is itself a form of spiritual maturity. It would seem to necessitate that our existence here is repeated or perhaps scrapped if we do not wake up. If the natural processes of being-development makes such a being that wakes up, that being can continue to the next level. Perhaps it filters through various levels and recycles us at any particular step we can't surmount. That could be interesting.
But what is waking up and why would it be important? Is waking up simply a belief? Is it something we actually experience profoundly? Am I already awake by asking all these questions or is there yet another step to take that I have not yet achieved? And again, why would it matter? Through my limited imagination, I could see it mattering if it's a step in evolution that would enable us to survive or fit in to the next level of existence. But what would it be...? If the layers are emotional filters... then it could really only be that of a particular level of spiritual maturity. Or maybe it's a matter of ability that waking up provides such as alchemy and manifestation.
Perhaps we can't survive the next level if we haven't managed to manipulate reality itself. That seems a bit steep though as I've only ever heard of Jesus doing that. But maybe the people who figure it out keep it to themselves. That would be inconsistent with divine purposes though. So if there are guides to help us, those who figure it out would likely not hide. So either there are no guides and all apparent attempts at guidance are frauds, or the requirement is not so stringent. Well, unless we truly only ever get one success every few thousand years, but that seems unlikely based upon the guidance itself. It seems far more focused on spiritual maturity and maturity alone. In that case, I continue to think that maturity is the greatest purpose to seek.
All that would truly remain then, is deciding what spiritual maturity actually is and determining how to achieve it. That sounds like a separate article so I shall stop here.
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