Personal Take on the Meaning of Life

I can't definitely know whether there is god and what god is on all levels of meaning. I know there is wind, and trees, and stars, and whole lot of matter in the universe. I'm just a small lump of matter. I'm just a small lump of matter that is somehow special in its arrangement from the majority of matter in that I am aware of something. I have my own priorities and will and I find my own meaning in the existence. I have some information already encoded in me, and also in other people, probably by the way I (and we) came into existence. How that came to be, I don't know and I will probably never know.

In nature at large, there is no evil, no vanity, no good, no bad. Nature just is, as the matter just is. In one nature's aspect of its many aspects — people — these concepts apparently exist. It is debatable how those concepts came into existence, or where from.

Any human-understandable concept of God is too small and restricted, including the following one, but I can try. If I think about everything known in reality, and of everything we know that is unknown, of any frame of reference, there is something outside of it, that cannot be perceived, cannot be described, cannot be conceptualized, cannot be comprehended by humans. There is nothing I can do about it, but it is a part of this reality, and might underpin something — or everything — that is or happens. And for me, that is God, and I believe in it. I've realized that much of my (and others') behavior is denial of the sheer incomprehensibly large part of reality we cannot understand and an attempt of bending one's view of reality into something concrete and mentally manageable; but that is not reality, that is not an acceptance of reality; it causes repeated clashes between what one thinks should happen and what happens, and that doesn't help with finding peace of mind and embracing reality as it is. In between much thought, meditation, and appreciation of the present moment, there are glimpses of how everything is connected, what a wonder it is that anything exists, and what incredible beauty and complexity can be found in anything, if studied closely enough or sincerely enough, without preconceptions, with a child-like appreciation, as if everything is seen for the first time.

We can think, yet don't understand much of the mind and consciousness. We are, yet we don't understand much of why we are. I believe in whatever there is, even though I can never understand it. After realizing this, these experiences stick, changing my perception of everything.

There's no way we can explain the Internet to an ant. I see ourselves as ants before something much bigger that we would be unable to see even if it was right before us.

In my opinion, any amount of humanely attainable knowledge can only be the ever-starting point for more and more thinking and learning.

The answer about the meaning of life is probably nothing concrete yet probably nothing complicated either. I think it's partly something that has existed with us and in us longer than our civilizations, ideas, or the concept of god, and partly something that is outside the realm of existence — a purely theoretical construct.

There are two levels to the answer. The first deals with everything, and the second with humans. At the first level, there's no other meaning in nature than the exact way of its existence which is its only meaning. (It can then be considered merely a label, a word, a construct.) There's no need for much else since the concept of "meaning" is anthropomorphic. At the second level, there's us — humans — whose brains work in such a way that we need a meaning, or answer, or explanation. A lot of our actions are just a coping strategy of being on terms with the fact that ultimately we have no definite answers.

Since humanity came to no satisfactory conclusion so far, by an improvised induction I infer that it won't come to one in my lifetime. And since I need an answer, a coping strategy, and none of the existing answers so far fully satisfies me, I need to find one myself, just for me. Some people came very close to with what I identify with, and their work helped me immensely on my journey towards the answer.

There is no single concrete goal to pursue. I want (or need?) to be happy and to do things that I feel are good and right. As indescribable a soul is, as indefinable is the definition of the good action. From there, everything else unwinds.