Over the last few weeks I have pondered quite a bit on the purpose of our lives. This has been precipitated by quite a few events, because of conversations that I have had, thoughts sparked off by something I have read, and also of course by the course of my own life especially in the last few months. We are taught often that when we get too close to an issue, it is good to take a step back and try to look at it from a different perspective. Try to remove yourself from the situation or distance yourself from the emotions. I think the same thing would be good to apply to life itself.
I am in the strange situation currently, of not really caring which way the wind blows the course of my life. Of course, having said that, it is restricted to the spheres of finance and career. Health and family are always excluded from such grandiose and sweeping statements. All my life I have felt I had something to lose, and hence was very wary of how events could transpire. Decisions were made based on calculations of what I stood to lose, rather than what I would gain. That elemental mindset was part and parcel of my value system, ingrained as a kid and institutionalized over the years by constant repitition. I guess my mindset could be categorized as a typical Indian middle class one, which a vast majority of my fellow citizens would have no problem in recognizing, as well as agreeing to. It is a defensive approach, hinging on minimization of risks, satisfaction in incremental returns and hence ensuring a self perpetuating cycle of indifferent progression.
Today however, I feel as if, I stand distanced from myself and hence anesthetized (or mildly sedated) from the impact of events around me. This state is also what others could call delusional!! I guess, having gone through the financial trauma that has affected most of the civilised world, having seen people I know and worked with, lose their jobs, seen the bubble of dreams created burst around me, has made me in some ways stronger. Anyway enough of this babble and back to the topic of the purpose of our existence. I am not a theologian, nor am I a great philosopher, and hence cannot hold a discourse on existentialism or think of providing fundamental truths about our being. All I can do is use the meager tools at my disposal, reflect and think of what all of this means to me as an individual.
Let us start with what we know (we shall not dabble with issues out of our realm like spiritualism and reincarnation). An average person lives up to 70 years, struggles to make ends meet, has children, and would probably see their grandchildren before they die. The maximum impact then that any of us have, will hence be limited to about 20 people in the world, representing 3 or at the most 4 generations both preceding and succeeding our own. I do not know of too many people who have known their great grandparents intimately, and with delayed marriages and having children later, it is quite likely that most of my generation will not live to see their own great grand children. What this means is that even though our life expectancy is growing, our span of influence has not increased, over the centuries. Other than a handful of people over the eons, almost all of humanity that has walked before us and also those who will walk this earth after us, will be like dust (not even rubble) beneath the feet of time. We will have spent our brief time on this earth in the false vanity that we all made a difference, if not on others, then at least on ourselves. Each of us will, in the decades that are allowed to us here, go through various phases of confusion, realization, and then some more head scratching confusion about why we exist at all. We will grapple for fundamental answers through reading, discussion and debate or thinking.
Scientist say that we are one of a handful of species that are self aware, (one way to define that is to state that we can recognize ourselves in the mirror). We as a species have always wondered about our place, initially on earth and then with expanded insight, in the universe. Being intelligent and creative and having taken over one planet almost entirely, we cannot believe that each of us does not have a unique place in history. We have theories about everlasting life, rebirth and the immortality of our souls. This life is just one more step in our infinite journey to reach nirvana. These provide us with some level of spiritual comfort that our lives and that our endeavors through the years on earth, will mean more than just living and dying meaninglessly.
How many of us would be able to face up to the realization that once gone, we are departed forever, never to step back on this world, in any shape or form? That an everlasting soul is just a figment of an active imagination? That all of theology, is just a collection of wonderful narrativess thought up by imaginative people, around campfires down the ages? How many would be shattered by the pointlessness then, of deriving any greater meaning to their lives? We are born, we live and then we die. We come into this world naked, and all we need are the clothes that cover us after death, a white cloth or the clothes interred with us in our coffins. All our lives, our efforts, striving and pain were then just to acquire these. It seems so sterile, so antiseptic, so cold and somehow clinical. Where then is the grandeur that one has come to expect from fables of gods and demons, and battles fought between good and evil, with the grasping of the undying soul as the ultimate trophy?
Coming back to this dimension, I think mankind's (or any other species for that matter) grand purpose is to have progeny to live on after them. Our children live on after us, and our purpose is to procreate, with the hope that one of our descendants in the long line to follow, will change the course of humanity or add to its store of knowledge. That one of them might become a great musician, a scientist or a humanist. That one of our seeds in future will pay back to the species, for the resources consumed by his/her ancestors since the dawn of time. It is then, not for us to question but to strive, to provide our offspring with a springboard to fly from. Our purpose is to nurture and to provide the opportunities to our children that were denied us, and so too our children to theirs, in an everlasting chain of virtuous upliftment, until one redeems the entire chain that bound them and supported their endeavors. That then (at least to me) is our grand purpose, and in so doing, we get the bonus of enjoying the unconditional love and the warmth, the hugs and the kisses of our children. We get to see them grow and flower, and along with them we grow too, as they teach us love and remind us of the unfettered joy of life and the unrestrained happiness of just being.
I would definitely feel that the purpose of my life has been more than met, if there is a Gandhi, a Newton, a Mother Theresa or a Beethoven to follow in any branch of my family tree. And even if not, we get to enjoy our children, the greatest gift that a human can have. I cannot think of a better deal than this, can you?
