If you’ve checked out my book, Discovering Life’s Purpose, or this blog, you know I feel nothing is more important to all of us than learning to live our lives on Earth according to our creator’s purpose for us. To that end, I’ve tried over the past decades to engage people whose thinking might help my discovery. I suspect you’re thinking, “Good luck with that!”. On occasion, I’ve found someone open to discussion of ideas and whose thinking significantly enriches mine. Most, though, treat the topic as the elephant in the room! Is it for you? If not, let’s engage each other? If so, can you help me discover what prevents you?
Could your problem be me? Have you found that, too often, I end up championing my own thinking and forget that I need to explore yours? If so, I can assure you that I’m working very hard to correct this and would value you pointing out when I fail. Or does something else deter you? Some fear unpleasant religious rants. Some people feel no need because life has no predetermined purpose, and their purpose is whatever they conclude it to be. Some find life’s struggles take priority. Some worry life’s purpose may be too onerous. Some have thought about life’s purpose but worry they won’t be able to defend their thinking. Shall we explore each of these reasons a bit more?
Firstly, can you not simply avoid religious rants? Is it not possible to avoid discussion of religion by simply changing the subject and by avoiding known proselytizers?
Secondly, how likely is it that our creator has predetermined our life purpose? Well, how likely is it that there even is a creator? Have you ever heard of anything that can create itself? If not, is it not more likely than not that we were created rather than self-created? If so, is it more likely that our creation was accidental or purposeful? If purposeful, must not our creator’s predetermined purpose for our lives trump any purpose we could come up with? Can anything be more important to us than to discover it?
Thirdly, life’s struggles can be all-consuming. But what if eternal life were real? Would not life’s struggles pale beside determining the purpose of eternal life? Well, how likely is it that we even have eternal life? In the Meaning of Life Video Series, you’ll find thinking that concludes eternal life is most assuredly real. Simply, the thinking goes like this. Have you encountered any loving and capable procreators who intend for their child to predecease them? Would that not be true of our creator as well? Must our creator not have existed before everything it created and thus be eternal? To not predecease an eternal creator, must our lives not be eternal? Does the importance of achieving our predetermined eternal life's purpose not trump the urgency of dealing with life’s earthly struggles?
Fourthly, might pursuing life’s purpose be too onerous? If life’s purpose is to selflessly and unconditionally love our creator and all its created, as we conclude in the Meaning of Life Video Series, might that not be overwhelmingly demanding? What do you find about your selfless and unconditional love of a partner or a loved one? Can it be very demanding? But do you not find it more rewarding than onerous?
Fifthly, how about fear of embarrassment? Can anyone know anything absolutely? Is others’ thinking not simply their opinion? Does the power of their argument make their thinking any better than yours? Can you not be as comfortable dismissing their thinking as they do yours? If their objective is to force their thinking on you, rather than to explore yours, is it not them that should be embarrassed rather than you. Should their inability to share thinking stop you from exploring thinking on life’s purpose with others capable of it?
Might it not be time to enrich your thinking on life’s purpose by confidently sharing your thinking with others?
Del H. Smith conducts research into life’s meaning and is the award-winning author
of the Amazon Best Seller, Discovering Life’s Purpose.