The meaning of life came to me in an email-a message. The 18-year-old nephew of a dear longtime friend of mine suffered heart failure recently. The next door neighbor was a paramedic-he rushed over to help even before an ambulance arrived. When tragedy strikes a life so young, it can leave us enraged, confused, hurt and searching for the meaning of life.
I think we all at some point wonder why we’re here. What is our purpose? Will I fulfill it? And why must we all suffer?
Making sense of bad situations is about as difficult as trying to live life without ever making a mistake. So, most of us learn to get by and through the bad times, we try to focus on knowing that this too shall pass. We read books, such as “When Bad Things Happen to Good People.” And maybe for a while we feel that we understand. Perhaps, all of us have, at one time or another, blocked out the pain in our lives by hardening our hearts. It is a constant conscientious effort to keep our hearts from turning bitter. I have been very blessed to be surrounded by people who keep on loving, learning and influencing others with their joy and enthusiasm for life despite their circumstances. It’s taught me the true meaning of life.
“Life is about gratitude–living with a grateful attitude of giving thanks for all you have even when you feel it might not be enough.”
“Love is about giving from your heart, not your head.”
Life is about following your dreams. A very interesting article, written by Dr. Gene Cohen in Newsweek Magazine on the subject of midlife crisis, explores the idea of why in our 40s and 50s we often begin to re-evaluate our lives. The author writes about a growing awareness of our own mortality and a new perspective of who we are and what matters most to us. These things become the catalyst for further personal discovery. But sometimes that can cause conflict as we may begin to realize that the life we’re living is not the one we chose.
“Life is about seeing things the way you want them to be. ”
In the midlife crisis article, Dr. Cohen noted that only 10 percent of those people he studied described the midlife transition as a “crisis”. If you want to see things differently, then change the way you look at them.
The meaning of life is discovered in the way you live your life every day. The meaning of life is found in how you invest your time. From the people you choose to spend time with to the things that occupy your day and mind.
“The meaning of life is found in creating and living a loving life.”
In another article, Love Is Real Medicine, from Newsweek by Dr. Dean Ornish, he clearly draws the connection between love and our health. He wrote that “love protects your heart in ways that we don’t completely understand.” Dr. Ornish cited a study at Yale: “men and women who felt the most loved and supported had substantially less blockage in their coronary arteries.”
I end where we began, by sharing with you that, miraculously and thankfully, my friend’s nephew, after much medical attention, especially from the neighbor, is alive and hopefully headed for recovery. This blessing is more evidence that the meaning of life is also about learning how we are meant to help each other.
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