This is a somewhat dated collection of my thoughts on purpose and life goals. Other posts have subsumed this topic but it’s still useful to look at it from a slightly different point of view.
Ask yourself: “what is my goal?”
Let’s assume that you start with “To make lots of money”. It may not be the most lofty answer, or the most sophisticated or morally satisfying one, but I am sure it’s a thought that every one of us had at some point in our lives.
Let’s explore this goal. Is this it? What if you had lots of money, but only that? You will probably realize that it’s not good enough. Money is useful to lead a comfortable life, but at the end of your life you will probably wish you could trade some of what you have left (after ensuring your family doesn’t struggle) against something else. Anything else.
For me, this broke down when I thought about all the people who were part of my life as I was growing up, They thought, they knew I will be remarkable in some way. Having money, one of the most universal mediums in human civilization is not remarkable — precisely because money is so universal,
I want to show them that I achieved more than just wealth. Otherwise it feels like all the people who made me what I am wasted a lot of time on me. It feels like I had potential that I didn’t utilize. So maybe there is something to do with expectations that others place on you based on your potential for greatness.
But if I did something remarkable, I wouldn’t want it to be undone after I die. This means that there is something greater than me. Either some kind of an afterlife where these expectations we met meta-materialize, or something to do with mankind itself.
Better still, the two don’t actually have to be that different. An afterlife could be an extension of all the intangible, metaphysical properties of the Universe. And if it is, what is your goal then?