Without coming off as overly existential or pretentious, I think a lacking area in most of our lives is a grounding in some sort of purpose, meaning, or reason for conducting our lives the way we do.
And while acting in accordance with outset practices or rituals can be that purpose for people, I’m not talking exclusively to those forms. This applies to all walks of life.
Sure, life can be lived without a baseline of values or beliefs, but it creates unnecessary volatility in how the actions of our lives play out. For better or for worse, our outcomes become much less predictable when we don’t know why we do the things we do.
And contrary to popular belief, our foundation isn’t important for the sole purpose of what happens at the end of our life, especially considering that it is the most uncertain outcome of all.
Our foundation matters for every moment and interaction of life. It matters when we choose who to be friends with, who we say “hi” to, and how we treat strangers on the street, especially those who make us feel uncomfortable.
We certainly have deeply ingrained tendencies within our interactions from thousands of years of evolution and the specific instructions we were given as children by our parents, but that doesn’t change the fact that we are completely in control of our actions.
That’s ultimately what matters. Controlling what we can control and letting the rest of the world run its course. There is no other way of being.
Because of how we have been brought up, we first need to come to an understanding of why we do the things we do. Only once we understand our basic values can we begin to mould ourselves into the people we want to be.
Goals are great, and necessary for moving the world forward, but they are meaningless unless we ask questions “why are we moving the world forward” and “what does ‘forward’ look like?”.
Take a step back from the crowd, question all your beliefs, and live a life that makes sense to you. Live a life you’d be proud to share.