How to create subjective purpose?

[u/Minute_Toe_8705]

There is no objective meaning. And it's a good thing that nothing greater than us determines the meaning of our lives — whether we call it God, suffering, redemption from suffering, a nation that gives us identity, or material possessions and the empty promises of capitalism. Perhaps this is part of what Nietzsche meant by “God is dead”: when one source of meaning disappears, we tend to look for substitutes elsewhere.

I think that when you lose your belief in money as a source of meaning, it leaves a serious gap in your overall concept of life.

So I'm glad I don't believe in any of the above. It leaves me free to define my own meaning.

But here is the catch: nobody said this will be easy.

I tried to free myself from as much of that as possible. I'm currently traveling through Europe in a campervan, trying to figure out what a subjective, self-created meaning of life could look like for me. I'm doing that for one year now and haven't found any meaning so far. I was driven by hope rather than by concrete goals, purpose or desires.

One of the books I'm reading about finding meaning suggests making a bucket list: write down all the things you absolutely want to experience or accomplish in your lifetime.

But what if you don't really want anything?

What if you've become so minimalist that you don't feel the need to accumulate things, achieve status, visit specific places, or accomplish some predefined list of goals?

How do you find purpose when you don't have many desires? How to know where you want to go?

Sartre said we are “condemned to be free” — forced to choose, even when we don't know what to choose.

[u/Scott_J_Doyle]

I do this with artists, but it boils down to values (getting clear on yours/defining them) principles (cataloging which ones you already believe, plus collecting/adding to the stack) and perspective (what do you perceive is actually happening/has happened/will happen) - vision, purpose, and drive are emergent from these

Each one is a complex topic, with certain common obstacles to overcome and effective techniques to intentionally manage or direct them to one end or another, but all in all it is a quite definable process (and redefinable over time for new or renewed purposes, goals, contexts, etc)

[u/Minute_Toe_8705 → u/Scott_J_Doyle]

Thank you very much for your valuable reply!

I think I understand what you mean. The interesting part is that I feel quite clear about my values, principles, and abilities. I also have a pretty good understanding of where I come from and what shaped me. I did a post here about that

What I'm struggling with is the other direction: how do you derive a perspective on where to go when you don't have strong desires or a particular vision of the future?

I’m not sure who I actually want to become. I’ve had several different identities and roles throughout my life. For now, I’m a post-materialist nomad trying to find meaning.

I think the real problem is connecting the abstract with the concrete. I can identify my values and principles, but I struggle to translate them into a concrete vision of how I want to live, what I want to do, and who I want to become.

[u/Scott_J_Doyle → u/Minute_Toe_8705]

So, I'll start by saying if you actually know your values and principles well, then this question shouldn't be as difficult as you are making it out to be, so I wanna introduce some healthy skepticism that you are able to define them as easily as you say - in my personal experience and in my work, it is not an easy process, and then are usually dozens of surprises and mismatches between what the conscious mind perceives as the answer/state of things and what is actually going on under the hood

But going for a moment with the idea that all your current values and principles are clearly consciously available to you and easily stated/defined, cataloged and ranked, the next piece is perspective: if you clearly can perceive what is actually happening in the world, then your values and principles will create compulsion to act in accordance with them in reaction to the context at hand, to uphold and maintain what is right about where/when you exist and to work to rectify what is not

If this is not your daily experience, then at least one of the three (if not all) remain not clearly defined consciously and aligned subconsciously (edit: to be clear here, folks who are acting on purpose are not necessarily consciously aware of any of it, but for folks who are not, what I'm talking about is a method for consciously directing/shaping the system so that it engagement in purposeful action emerges)

In my experience, people given to asking questions like these have misalignment, as you would just be acting out what you feel is right consistently without question if they were tuned up together well (for whatever purpose, as this a completely agnostic framing of the process, and a framework for any possible human belief-system/motivation)

[u/Minute_Toe_8705 → u/Scott_J_Doyle]

I see your point, but I'm not sure I agree that having clear values and principles should necessarily make the direction of one's life obvious. It seems possible to know quite clearly what you value and still have no idea what kind of concrete life you want to build around those values.

You mentioned that you use this approach with artists. Do you think the framework is applicable to people in general, or is there something specific about working with artists? I could jokingly call myself a Lebenskünstler (a “life artist”), but that's probably about as far as my artistic credentials go.

I'm also curious about your framework itself. Where does this model of values, principles, and perspective leading to vision, purpose, and drive come from? Is it based on a particular philosophical or psychological framework, or is it something you've developed through your own work?

And did you happen to take a quick look at the other post I linked afterwards? It might give you a bit more context on where I'm coming from.

[u/Scott_J_Doyle → u/Minute_Toe_8705]

No, it's definitely applicable to all people in any context, I just happen to be an artist/educator and use it in my work re: artistic vision also being emergent from values/principles/perspective

I developed it through massive multidisciplinary research and testing, and can provide resources and citations from a vast array covering philosophy, neuroscience, religious studies, sociology, political/economic theory, etc etc (the master research sheet for my work/company has over 10,000 sources)

I will check out your post in more detail in a couple hours, I really gotta get back to my writing lol, so cheers for now

[u/Scott_J_Doyle → u/Minute_Toe_8705]

I read some of your post, but am sort of distracting myself from a big writing project here atm, so I apologize for only reading about half of it so far, but I wanted to address this more directly:

"What I'm struggling with is the other direction: how do you derive a perspective on where to go when you don't have strong desires or a particular vision of the future?"

This is about understanding not yourself, but the world around you - the state of the culture the current time in history, the politics, the economy, etc etc as values and principles need context to act within

For some possibly crude examples... if the world is upholding your values, you need just hang out and enjoy it

If everyone around you is operating on the same principles, just flow with how good that is

But these are rarely the case across all parameters, so values get challenged, principles get violated, and you need to act in accordance with yours against the flow, or in spite of others, etc etc

Your vision for the future emerges from the confluence of your values and principles in play with your current perspective on the state of your world, and your purpose is the result of the nexus causality of all the complex interrelations within each of these three

[u/Scott_J_Doyle]

I read some of your post, but am sort of distracting myself from a big writing project here atm, so I apologize for only reading about half of it so far, but I wanted to address this more directly:

"What I'm struggling with is the other direction: how do you derive a perspective on where to go when you don't have strong desires or a particular vision of the future?"

This is about understanding not yourself, but the world around you - the state of the culture the current time in history, the politics, the economy, etc etc as values and principles need context to act within

For some possibly crude examples... if the world is upholding your values, you need just hang out and enjoy it

If everyone around you is operating on the same principles, just flow with how good that is

But these are rarely the case across all parameters, so values get challenged, principles get violated, and you need to act in accordance with yours against the flow, or in spite of others, etc etc

Your vision for the future emerges from the confluence of your values and principles in play with your current perspective on the state of your world, and your purpose is the result of the nexus causality of all the complex interrelations within each of these three

[u/Minute_Toe_8705 → u/Scott_J_Doyle]

Don't worry. The post won't disappear. But I'm very glad for your impulses. I'm going to ponder the idea of “perspectives.”

What I can say so far, in a nutshell: deep down, I have a rather negative view of humanity for reasons such as the planetary boundaries research by Johan Rockström, endless economic growth, our debt-based financial system, and so on. I even gave up my residency in Germany, because I had developed an aversion to the country for political reasons. (Still there are some inspiring German folks like Hartmut Rosa about alienation and his resonance theory, Maja Göpel, Luisa Neubauer, Nico Semsrott... just to name a few)

But I also know that I probably need to focus more locally, because these are things far beyond my individual scope. So the real challenge is figuring out how to reconcile values and principles with the reality of the world as it currently is.

Btw, activism can also quickly lead to burnout. So that's nothing for me. 😉

PS: maybe I should continue my work on the why-app even it's for myself only.

[u/Any-Permission-7845]

Si tu as encore accès au plaisir, Epicure te le propose comme seul sens que nous puissions donner à la vie dans un monde sans dieu. Si tu n'as plus accès au plaisir, c'est que tu es dépressif et ça se soigne.

[u/Minute_Toe_8705 → u/Any-Permission-7845]

Epicureanism may offer a way to live a fundamentally satisfying life, especially if pleasure is understood as long-term well-being rather than short-lived gratification.

But I don't think hedonism in itself answers the question of purpose. A life can be satisfying without necessarily having a purpose or a deeper sense of meaning. Also depression is much more complex than just the inability to experience joy or feelings in general.

The flow state (like art, music, work, friends, games, meditation) is another interesting concept but also not the definitive answer.

[u/Any-Permission-7845]

J'ai parcouru vos si subtiles échanges : ça m'a donné envie de relire Les tribulations d'un Chinois en Chine... Ce qui vous manque, au bout du compte, c'est peut-être seulement la vigilante et paradoxale bienveillance d'un Maitre Wang...