Quotes about Meaning of Life

“People say that what we’re all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think that what we’re really seeking is an experience of being alive, so that our life experiences on the purely physical plane will have resonances within our inner most being and reality, so that we can actually feel the rapture of being alive.”
Joseph Campbell, The Power Of Myth, via Sunbeams (Page 82)

“Everything that matters is something we’ve chosen to do. Everything that matters is a skill and an attitude. Everything that matters is something we can learn. The practice is choice plus skill plus attitude. We can learn it and we can do it again.”
Seth Godin, The Practice (Page 102)

“There is no use in one person attempting to tell another what the meaning of life is. It involves too intimate an awareness. A major part of the meaning of life is contained in the very discovering of it. It is an ongoing experience of growth that involves a deepening contact with reality. To speak as though it were an objective knowledge, like the date of the war of 1812, misses the point altogether. The meaning of life is indeed objective when it is reached, but the way to it is by a path of subjectivities… The meaning of life cannot be told; it has to happen to a person.”
Ira Progoff, via Sunbeams (Page 56)

“You are here to aid in the great expansion of consciousness. You are not here to cry about the miseries of the human condition but to change them when you do not find them to your liking through the joy, strength, and vitality that is within you; to create the spirit as faithfully and beautifully as you can in flesh.”
Jane Roberts, The Nature Of Personal Reality, via Sunbeams (Page 52)

“…It is impossible to define the meaning of life in a general way. Questions about the meaning of life can never be answered by sweeping statements. ‘Life’ does not mean something vague, but something very real and concrete, just as life’s tasks are also very real and concrete. They form man’s destiny, which is different and unique for each individual… When a man finds that it is his destiny to suffer, he will have to accept his suffering as his task, his single and unique task… No one can relieve him of his suffering or suffer in his place. His unique opportunity lies in the way in which he bears his burden. For us, as prisoners, these thoughts were not speculations far removed from reality. They were the only thoughts that could be of help to us. They kept us from despair, even when there was no chance of coming out of it alive.”
Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search For Meaning, via Sunbeams (Page 27)

“The idea of a meaningless universe is in itself a highly creative imaginative act. Animals… could not imagine such an idiocy, so the theory shows an incredible accomplishment of an obviously ordered mind and intellect that can imagine itself to be the result of non-order or chaos—you have a creature who is capable of mapping its own brain, imagining that the brain’s fantastic regulated order could emerge from a reality that has no meaning.”
Jane Roberts, The Individual And The Nature Of Mass Events, via Sunbeams (Page 15)

A simple perspective on life:

Sir Wilfred Grenfell Quote on Meaning and How Service Is The Rent We Pay For Our Room On Earth

“The service we render to others is really the rent we pay for our room on this earth. It is obvious that man is himself a traveler; that the purpose of this world is not ‘to have and to hold’ but ‘to give and to serve.’ There can be no other meaning.”
Sir Wilfred T. Grenfell

Beyond the Quote (313/365)

How could the purpose of the world be ‘to have and to hold’ if nothing that we have and nothing that we hold onto will come with us at the end of our lives? It will all be left behind—every prized possession, every luxury, and every dollar. What could possibly be the purpose of hoarding it all from one part of the world to your part of the world? It will simply be hauled from your part, back, when you die. It seems futile when you really think about it.

“Sometimes people miss the missing link about the meaning of life: it’s you. It’s always been about you and what you’re about. If you’re about nothing, then life is about nothing. If you’re about love and truth, then life is about love and truth. If you’re about creating something great, then life is about that, and so on. Life is waiting for you to take the lead, but you’re staring into the sky waiting to be lead. So it’s a standoff, and the clock keeps on ticking.”
Les Matheson, Quora

Sadhguru Quote on Priorities and How Discovering Your “Everest” Will Change Your Life

“You cannot be partying till early morning and attempt to scale Mount Everest tomorrow!”
Sadhguru, Inner Engineering (Page 223)

Beyond the Quote (298/365)

We all have an “Everest” in our lives. A challenge that surpasses all of the other challenges we could face and yet, excites us to our core. A challenge that we know is going to take every ounce of strength and vigor and focus that we have and yet, still entices us to step forward. A challenge that feels right. One which our whole lives have prepared us for and one that matches our drive to our potential; our talents to our interests; our aptitude to our attitude. The type of challenge that you would skip a full night of partying for because your mission is more important to you.

“People ask me, ‘What is the use of climbing Mount Everest?’ and my answer must at once be, ‘It is of no use.’ There is not the slightest prospect of any gain whatsoever. Oh, we may learn a little about the behavior of the human body at high altitudes, and possibly medical men may turn our observation to some account for the purposes of aviation. But otherwise nothing will come of it. We shall not bring back a single bit of gold or silver, not a gem, nor any coal or iron… If you cannot understand that there is something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes out to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and forever upward, then you won’t see why we go. What we get from this adventure is just sheer joy. And joy is, after all, the end of life. We do not live to eat and make money. We eat and make money to be able to live. That is what life means and what life is for.”
George Mallory, Climbing Everest

“If you really want to know spirituality, don’t look for anything. People think spirituality is about looking for God or truth or the ultimate. The problem is you have already defined what you are looking for. It is not the object of your search that is important; it is the faculty of looking. The ability to simply look without motive is missing in the world today. Everybody is a psychological creature, wanting to assign meaning to everything. Seeking is not about looking for something. It is about enhancing your perception, your very faculty of seeing.”
Sadhguru, Inner Engineering (Page 15)

I shall not live in vain.

“I believe that we are here—on this star is space—to help one another. And first, we have to survive. And then we have to thrive. And to thrive—to express ourselves—we have to know ourselves. What do you love? If you get close to what you love, who you are will be revealed to you—and it expands.”
Ethan Hawke, TED

Have you quit your search? Stay woke.

Mark Manson Quote on Problems and How A Problem-Free Life Should Never Be The Goal

“Problems never stop; they merely get exchanged and/or upgraded.”
Mark Manson, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck

Beyond the Quote (274/365)

Let’s be clear: the goal shouldn’t be to live a problem-free life. There is no such thing as a problem free life. How could it be? The very act of staying alive and healthy is a forever shape-shifting landscape of compiling problems that confront us afresh every minute of every day. So, what is the goal then?

“We are born on our own /
And we die on our own /
And we’re here to make meaning /
Of what happens in between /
We could hate, we could love /
We could doubt, we could trust /
But we’re here to make meaning /
For as long as we’re breathing and it’s alright /
Wherever you are, it’s alright /
Whoever you are, it’s alright”
Alicia Keys, Authors of Forever, ALICIA

Beyond the Quote (271/365)

Word choice matters. And with the opening concept of meaning in this above quote, I think Alicia nails it: We’re here to make meaning. We’re not here to find meaning. And I don’t think we’re here to mean nothing. Why be given life if we’re not meant to live? Why be given brains if we’re not meant to think? Why be given eyes if we’re not meant to see? Why be given hands if we’re not meant to touch? Why be given feet if we’re not meant to move? We’re certainly not born just to die—what’s the point in believing that? We’re born on our own, yes, but we’re not alone and we’re not born without what we need to make meaning—of that I’m sure.

“To make life a little better for people less fortunate than you, that’s what I think a meaningful life is. One lives not just for oneself but for one’s community.”
Ruth Bader Ginsburg, CNN

“Information is everywhere but its meaning is created by the observer that interprets it. Meaning is relative and there is no objective, over-arching meaning.”
Naval Ravikant, Medium

12 Illuminating Stephen Cope Quotes from The Great Work Of Your Life on Mastery and Fulfillment

Excerpt: These 12 deep quotes from The Great Work Of Your Life will help you live more deliberately, more aligned, and in a more meaningful way.