What gives your life purpose/meaning?

[Gracing]

Ever since I was a child I've always questioned my purpose in life. I wish I could just live day to day - I have a nice job, nice partner, nice home, nice holidays. Yet fundamentally I feel a bit lost and always prone to thinking 'what is the point of it all?' I don't feel actively depressed, just in search of something which I haven't found yet. It seems to me that most days are exactly the same - work, home, sleep, repeat. I do have hobbies but they seem more like temporary distractions than anything purposeful iyswim? I look at the people around me and they seem to plod along and don't constantly question the meaning of it all as I do, yet I can't seem to stop. I know most people by definition seem to live fairly 'ordinary' lives, but I don't seem to feel content with the routine of it. I know I do have a nice life and ought to be grateful - I'm working on that!

What gives your life purpose/meaning? Are you content or do you feel a sense of searching as well?

I used to feel a bit like this. I used to fill my life with hobbies because I thought if I didn't it make me an uninteresting person.
Now I think that life has different phases and you have to embrace and make the most of each phase you are in. Late teens and twenties were about travel, partying, career and hobbies.
Now I am in the thick of young kids and babies. My career is plodding but on the back burner and I have no time for hobbies. My kids are my hobby. They are what I put all my time and energy into and I enjoy spending time with them and looking at life through a kids eyes. If people think that makes me boring I don't care. When they are older I hope I can pick up a few hobbies again and start enjoying more me time, travel etc, and maybe pick up my career a bit. I hope to save enough to do retirement well. I also put a lot of energy into my friendships as that is important to me. Hopefully will have lots of friends to enjoy retirement with. Of course my dh too. Think it's important to invest in your relationship so you still have stuff to say to each other when the kids are grown.

I didn’t really discover what I wanted to do in life till my 30s. Now I love my job, I get to have a positive influence on peoples’ lives in a small but meaningful way. And cheesy as it sounds, try to live well, be a better person, and a good friend and neighbour. I never wanted children but there are many other things in my life that bring happiness. Especially cats.

It feels like a weird question to me.

Expecting anything to "give my life meaning" sounds like a recipe for disappointment.

It's OK by me that most of my choices only affect me and only have meaning to me.

I guess I'm no use to you here, because the thing that make you think "that's sad or depressing" or wonder "what is the point", I look at those things and think "yep, seems fine".

The closest my life ever gets to having any sort of meaning is when I am helping someone in some way

That ABSOLUTELY did not mean to sound smug, and it certainly isn’t when I am happiest, it just feels the most as though I am contributing something to the world.

I give myself purpose and meaning.

That makes things mundane a lot of the time.

That's life.

[Note: this looks dismal. But it really doesn't feel that way.]

I'm the same!

I live in a large town in the NW and just dream of something "more"?

On the outside everythings great, I'm in my mid 20s, engaged, my partner is actually a wonderful person who I want to spend the rest of my life with, own our own home, work in a job in the industry that I got my degree in....

But i feel like something is missing.

I'm at a cross road where I feel like I dont know if I want to move to London to accelerate my career or to have a baby as I am really broody and could afford one if we decided to go for that.

Lifes a puzzle eh!

The person up-post who has a friend with whom they ‘chat’ everyday. That is a blessing, to have a connection which offers the opportunity to make sense of your respective worlds.

I wonder about this a lot as well OP. I've never felt drawn to a particular faith and I have children, who keep me busy and give me a reason to live, however I believe we are all here to learn lessons. I believe in reincarnation and that our souls are eternal. I believe we reincarnate on earth and in other places to learn lessons and to further our development as souls. It's not about what job you have, how much money you have or whether you have kids or not. You are here to work on your soul and to develop.

For example, your soul may be prone to being critical of others, so in this life time you will learn to accept others for who they are. That's just an example. I've had difficult times and challenges over the years and at the time, I just felt upset and despair but with a lot of those situations looking back, I learnt so much and developed / gained wisdom.

"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans" (John Lennon)

NewAndImprovedNorks doesn't sound smug at all. Unread somewhere that they did a study into what makes people happy and, in Japan I think it was, they found that if you asked people to do something that made them happy, they would go off and try and make someone else happy. I may have slightly garbled the study(!) But the gist was that there are places where happiness is strongly tied to making other people happy not materialism or hobbies.

@ingoodcompany I am just struggling with the first few chapters of an Alexander McCall Smith and you have strengthened my resolve to read it!!

This! This is the purpose!! Just post a kind thing and a stranger's life is potentially enriched in some small way.

Oh SummerHouse, that is lovely!

AMcCS not for all, but the tales are simple and remind me of the plight of humanity. Wherever you are, someone else will have had the same problem before.

Another book (film was bit naff!) was Hector & His Search For Happiness.

The best ever is non-fiction: Man’s Search for Happiness by Victor Frankl.

But really - please watch The Kindness Diary as a restorative! It does help to have a ‘compassion pack’ for trudging through.

Someone mentioned my friendship with my lovely nearly-90 year old. Oh he is so wise! I have also befriended a neighbour of a similar age, and his very simple take on life (also lives off-grid!) is a lovely balm.

Was wondering if maybe rather than asking about seeking the meaning of life, we should seek a life with meaning?

Today was a bit better for this thread, but I have some really dark moments. Not suicidal, but questioning existence.

Our only purpose is to procreate really. Nothing else really matters. So just do things that make you happy. Hobbies, interests, a job where you feel you are contributing something positive to the world. I look at people whose aspirations are engagement, wedding, house, babies, and I don't get it. I want more. I don't know what that is but I do know I have an interesting, full life, but that's because I fill it with people and things I find interesting and enjoyable. Maybe I'll figure out what 'more' is one day (maybe it is children?) But until then I'm having fun. You're a long time dead. Stop focussing on what it is in the future that might make you happy and enjoy what it is you can do today - a cinema trip, the theatre, making art, singing, laughing, excellent telly, gardening, a particularly nice packed lunch.... Being grateful for small things will make you happier.

seek a life with meaning rather than the meaning of life. I love this. I am going to watch the kindness diary too. And one day I will probably pass on the tip to someone else. Thank you ingoodcompany

I guess I feel like that. I work in healthcare, which I generally enjoy, but I no longer find it gives my life meaning as it did at the beginning- many years ago.

I've started volunteering with the Samaritans last year and that helps in thinking that life has meaning and that I can help people in some way.

When I'm stressed or upset I remember my husband and how much he loves me, makes me feel secure. He gives my life meaning.

It's hard, you're born, you work, you die. Not sure what else to say really.

Try mindfulness OP, it may give you a different perspective.

So many people chase after things for future fulfillment but overlook the here and now.

Man's search for meaning, by Victor Frankl helped me with this question, after the sudden death of DH. It's a short, amazing book.

Also, this poem by Raymond Carver:

And did you get what
you wanted from this life, even so?
I did.
And what did you want?
To call myself beloved, to feel myself
beloved on the earth.

Love is everything. When I feel lost I try to remember this - and I try to pass it on. Not just the big stuff, but the small acts of kindness too.

Look out not in. Supplement the hobbies with activities useful to your community, or wider society. Make life better for friends and family and colleagues and, sometimes, random strangers.

There isn't one specific thing. Just lots of little or big things added together...my kid,my (badly paid,want to bang head on the wall 263883 times a day) job, my friendships, my relationship, the matchbox flat,the cat ,my books and so on.

None of it is glamorous or perfect. All of it could be improved or better. But I don't have the time or inclination to look or dream for better, I make do with what I've got and find happiness and fulfilment here.

I've lived too much and been fucked up in many ways. I moved around a lot. I've moved countries. I've made a billion mistakes. I've lost people and I've left people behind. I'm settled now... I'm home. And that's enough.

Just trying to survive; keep holding down a job that puts food in my mouth and a roof over my head and in the process try not to go mad.

I frequently ask nobody in particular 'Why am I here? - What is the point of me?'

I have a Christian faith which underpins my life and values. I don't put much stock in material things ( though struggle with the judgements others make about my life based on that criteria ) but really I believe in finding out what excites you and going for it wholeheartedly.
For me I love being a mother and now my birth children are grown I am a foster carer and adoptor with 2 young children with v complex medical needs and disabilities. It is my passion. It certainly gives me purpose as they need 24 hour care.
That all makes me sound terribly worthy but in fact it is selfish really because I get so much back from it.
So I say again, follow your heart and do whatever it is you love and which fires you up. I don't think you can go far wrong then !

I feel this way too. I first started having these thoughts when my dad just dropped dead in front of me when I was a teenager. At the time he was over the moon they could finally afford sky. I just felt very what was the point of it all.

Nowadays my children give me some meaning. I work with disabled children which I love but the pay is pretty bad so we dont have much going on outside of work and school. I am a single mum so dont have any friends and spend most evening watching TV or doing my nvq and often feel like what's the point of it all it's all so mundane and lonely. I do find family helps though I visit my nan every week and talk to her most days on the phone my children are so lucky to have a great grandmother. I also talk to my mum every day and meet up with my siblings when I can. These things make me happy so sometimes I do wonder if it's the little things that give life purpose but we often miss them as we are too busy looking for something more.

Oh my gosh me too! Although my lack of purpose and ‘point to it all’ has contributed to crippling depression.