A man walks in a construction site, sees three men working and asks the first one he comes across :
- “What are you working on in here ?”
- “I’m laying bricks.”
He moves on and asks another worker :
- “What are you working on in here ?”
- “I’m building a wall !”
He moves on again and asks a third worker the same question :
- “What are you working on in here ?”
- “I’m building a cathedral !”
They are all doing the exact same work. But the way they see it is drastically different. Because it’s not what you do that matters, it’s why you do it.
The reason for that is fairly simple : knowing why you do things gives you coherence with yourself. Which is just another word for identity. Identity is what stays identical in any situation or circumstances. You could be angry, happy, young, old, rich, poor, if you are a rock music lover, you will stay a rock music lover in any of these situations.
If you never think in terms of why, it is much harder for you to find coherence, consistency over time. For what you are doing will always evolve over time, as change is part of life. Identity is your shelter amid the storm of constant change. That was a point I detailed in one of my previous publications :
The reason why you do things lives on. The things you do are ephemeral. The guy who thinks he is building a cathedral is still building a cathedral when he has lunch, when he takes a break or even when he sleeps. It is his purpose, his mission. For the one who is only laying bricks, everything changes the moment he stops working.
Austrian psychiatrist Viktor Frankl was opposed to Freud, for whom everyone was mainly driven by their desires. He observed in the Nazi concentration camps, that men were capable of living and dying for their values and ideals. And he believed that he who has a reason for living can bear almost anything.
Conversely, in the absence of meaning, even the most comfortable of lives can become unbearable. Ignoring the importance of meaning — being a nihilist — will get you depressed before you know it.
Meaning is oxygen to a human soul. Finding this oxygen should be your main quest. Do not let everything in your life go sour, and ask yourself the deep reason why you are doing what you do. And do not stop asking before you have a very clear answer.
Paul
I wrote about the meaning I found for my life in this previous publication :
What is your why you'd say?
(This could be a bit intrusive, I'd prefer a I-can't-answer answer rather than a lame one aha)