On the way to happiness: what is the most important thing in life?

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:47

We all sooner or later think: what is the most important thing in life? Why do we even live? Where are we heading and what should be this path? These questions must be resolved. Knowing the meaning of life, you can understand the meaning of death.

What is the most important thing in life?

The desire to know the purpose of our stay on earth distinguishes us from animals. "A man without a goal always wanders," said the ancient philosopher Seneca.

It is difficult to unwind the tangled tangle of life's twists and turns from birth, but you can try to do it from a very definite and obvious end - death, which is the result of human life. If you look from this angle, it becomes clear that a person's life is meaningless and illusory, because the most important stage of life is not taken into account - death.

Meanings are delusions:

1. The meaning of life is life itself. The phrase, of course, is beautiful, but completely “empty”! It is clear that we sleep not for the sake of sleep, but for the restoration of our body. And we breathe not for the sake of breathing, but for the oxidative processes necessary for the body to occur.

2. The main thing in life isself-realization. You can often hear that the most important thing in life is to realize your dreams and opportunities. You can achieve success in different areas: politics, art, family, etc.

This view is not new. And Aristotle believed that the most important thing in life is success, valor and achievement.

A person, of course, must achieve his goals and develop. But to make this the meaning of life is a mistake. In the context of the inevitability of death, it does not matter whether a person has realized himself or not. Death equalizes all. Neither self-realization nor life success can be taken to the next world!

3. Pleasure is what counts

Even the ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus argued that the meaning of life is to receive pleasure, achieve bliss and peace. The cult of consumption and pleasure flourishes in modern society. But Epicurus also noted that one cannot live for pleasure without harmonizing one's desires with ethics. And in our society, no one does this anymore. Advertising, talk shows, reality shows, and numerous TV shows encourage people to live for pleasure. We read, see, hear calls to take everything from life, to catch luck "by the tail", to "break away" to the fullest, etc.

The cult of pleasure is inextricably linked with the cult of consumption. To have fun, we need to order, buy, win something. This is how we turn into meaningless "semi-humans", for whom the main thing in life is to drink, eat, satisfy sexual needs, sleep, dress up, walk, etc. Man himself limits the significance of his life to the satisfaction of primitive needs.

Pleasure may not be the meaning of life thoughfor one simple reason: it passes. Any need brings satisfaction only for a while, and then arises again. We are in pursuit of pleasure and earthly goods like drug addicts in need of the next dose of pleasure. Such a perception turns, ultimately, into emptiness and a spiritual crisis. We live as if we were going to live forever. And only death shows the deceitfulness of the consumer trend.

4. The meaning of life is in close people

Often it seems to us that the meaning of life is in parents, children, spouse. Many say so: “He is everything to me! I live for him. Of course, to love, to help go through life, to sacrifice something for the sake of relatives is right and quite natural. We all want to have a family, love and raise children. But can this be the meaning of life? In fact, this is a dead end path. Dissolving in a loved one, we sometimes forget about the main needs of our soul.

Any person is mortal and having once lost a loved one, we will inevitably lose the incentive to live on. It will be possible to get out of this most difficult crisis if you find your true true purpose. Although it is possible to “switch” to another object and make sense of it. That's what some people do. But such a need for a symbiotic connection is already a psychological disorder.

You will never find the meaning of your being on earth if you look for it among the above. To find the most important thing in life, you need to change your point of view, and this requires knowledge.

Man has always been interested in the question of his destiny, people beforefaced the same problems as we did. At all times there have been troubles, lies, betrayal, emptiness of the soul, catastrophes, despair, illness and death. People de alt with it. And we can take advantage of this colossal store of knowledge that the previous generation has accumulated. Instead, we brush aside this invaluable experience. We use the knowledge of our ancestors in medicine, mathematics, use technological inventions, and in the main issue - understanding our existence - we reject their knowledge.

And our ancestors saw the meaning of their existence in educating themselves, their souls, self-development and approaching God, recognized the afterlife and the immortality of the soul. All earthly goods and needs lost their value in the face of death.

The main thing begins after death. Then everything falls into place and makes sense. Our life is a school, training, testing and preparation for eternity. It is logical that the most important thing now is to prepare as best as possible for it. The quality of our life in the eternal world depends on how responsibly we approached learning in the "school".

Our stay on earth is similar to the period of intrauterine development, because being in the womb for nine months is also a lifetime. No matter how good and pleasant, calm and comfortable a child is in this world, he will have to leave it. The misfortunes and pain that we encounter along the way can be compared to the pain experienced by a baby during childbirth: they are inevitable and everyone goes through them, they are temporary, although they sometimes seem endless, theyare nothing compared to the joy of meeting the pleasures of a new life.

Pascal's Bet

French scientist Blaise Pascal wrote several philosophical works, one of which is called Pascal's Wager. In it, Pascal is talking to an imaginary atheist. He believes that we are all forced to bet whether there is a God and life after death.

If there is no God, then the believer does not lose anything - he just lives with dignity and dies - this is his end.

If He exists, and a person has lived all his life, based on the conviction that nothing awaits him after death, dying - he loses everything! Is such a risk justified? Risking eternal happiness for a short stay in the ghost world!

Imaginary atheist exclaims that he "doesn't play these games." To which Pascal retorts: “It is not in our will to play or not to play,” recalling the inevitability of choice. We are all, regardless of our desire, involved in this bet, because everyone has to make a choice (and no one will make it for us): to believe in a future life or not.

In any case, the wiser is the one who lives on the basis that the Creator of all things exists and the soul is immortal. This is not about a blind hope that something or someone is “out there”, but about a conscious choice of faith in the One God, which already today, in the present, gives a person meaningfulness, peace and joy.

Here it is - medicine for the soul and the acquisition of a calm and happy life in this and the next world. Take and use. But no! We don't even want to try.

Man resists gaining the truth, namely everything that is connectedwith religion. Why does this resistance and rejection arise even after understanding what is most important in life? Because we all live to a certain extent in our own fictional world, in which we feel comfortable and cozy, we know and understand everything about it. More often this world is based not on a sober assessment of oneself and reality, but on changeable and deceptive feelings, therefore, reality is presented to us in a very distorted form.

And if a person makes a choice in favor of faith in God, finds the true meaning of his being, then he will have to reshape and rebuild his entire life in accordance with this knowledge. As a result, the pillars on which our entire worldview rested are crumbling. It's pretty stressful for everyone. After all, we are all very attached to our usual life. In addition, we are afraid of working on ourselves. After all, on the path to the truth, you will have to make efforts, remake yourself, work on your soul. It is too lazy to go along this road, especially if a person is already obsessed with material needs and pleasures. Therefore, we are content with surrogates, which are worthless. Wouldn't it be better to make an effort and exchange imaginary comfort for true happiness!

Injustice triumphs

For many, the stumbling block on the path to sincere faith in God is the thought of the injustice of the world. Those who live with dignity suffer, children who have not had time to commit any sin, and those who dishonor on earth prosper. From the position of earthly life, if you believe that everything ends in death - the argument is verywe althy. Then it is really impossible to understand the prosperity of the unrighteous and the suffering of the righteous.

If you look at the situation from the position of eternity, then everything becomes clear. Good or evil is considered in this case not from the point of view of being on earth, but of benefit for a person in an endless life. In addition, while suffering, you realize a very important fact - this world is damaged and it is impossible to achieve absolute happiness in it. This place is not for enjoyment, but for training, learning, fighting, overcoming, etc.

Eternal happiness, free from all anguish and sadness, can be comprehended only through the awareness of all the sorrows of this world apart from God. Only by feeling "in one's own skin" all the sadness of this world can one grieve about the break with the real source of happiness - God.