[yt-sdb]

My favorite quote on the meaning of life, from Viktor Frankl's "Man's Search for Meaning":

> For the meaning of life differs from man to man, from day to day and from hour to hour. What matters, therefore, is not the meaning of life in general but rather the specific meaning of a person's life at a given moment. To put the question in general terms would be comparable to the question posed to a chess champion: "Tell me, Master, what is the best move in the world?" There simply is no such thing as the best or even a good move apart from a particular situation in a game and the particular personality of one's opponent. The same holds for human existence. One should not search for an abstract meaning of life. Everyone has his own specific vocation or mission in life to carry out a concrete assignment which demands fulfillment. Therein he cannot be replaced, nor can his life be repeated. Thus, everyone's task is as unique as is his specific opportunity to implement it.

[hayst4ck]

I remember reading this book and there were 3 paragraphs of philosophical value in the whole book. This is one of those three paragraphs. I found the book very disappointing. "The meaning of life is to live every moment as if it had meaning?" That is a thesis which felt foreign and useless. I felt no closer to meaning after reading that book.

It was in a self help psychology book that I thought communicated the core idea of meaning and purpose the best: Meaning == Feeling

The author (I believe of: running on empty) made the statement that a struggle to find purpose is the same thing as a struggle to feel and that life's purpose is to feel. Feelings are the fuel for our lives. So those with blunted emotions obviously feel no sense of purpose because the purpose of life is to feel emotions.

Struggling with a lack of meaning is the same thing as struggling to feel. If you knew what would make you feel, it would obviously be meaningful to interact with that.

Bringing this idea back to Frankl, his work becomes much more accessible: The purpose of life is to live every moment with feeling. Finding meaning means seeing what makes you feel.

[manmal]

“The meaning of life is to live every moment as if it had meaning” sounds wise and livable to me.

> a struggle to find purpose is the same thing as a struggle to feel

I think feeling is a means to an end, and that there are deeper reasons for a lack of purpose:

- Loss (eg after death of loved ones, or of abilities)

- Change (eg of the shape of a relationship) that is hard to adapt to

- Inability to end current adversity (eg emotional pain that can’t be stopped due to circumstances)

For those, people find “workarounds” that numb their feelings (drugs, workaholism, constant distractions etc) so they don’t have to feel the emotional pain (which they currently have no real fix for) all the time. The search for a purpose is IMO a search for anything that resolves the emotional pain. As soon as the pain is gone, “feeling” is safe again and no longer has to be suppressed.

[hayst4ck]

I read Frankl's book as a depressed person who saw lack of meaning as the root of my problems, namely of anhedonia (used casually, not medically). Frankl's book is written for normal functional people. What wasn't clear is that the state of anhedonia is not a result of lack of meaning, anhedonia is lack of meaning.

I was reading it hoping for an algorithm to find any meaning at all.

For you "meaning" seems to mean something. For me "meaning" was a null pointer exception. The variable name "meaning" is understood in a general sense, but when you try to manipulate the idea or collide it with other ideas, everything breaks down. If you can't de-reference "meaning" then Frankl's work is quite opaque since "meaning" is primarily a feeling and most people's understanding of it is intuitive rather than prescriptive. Frankl is never able to jump out of the intuitive understanding of meaning, and so for someone who the idea of "meaning" is not intuitive his work was quite inaccessible.

Once you understand that meaning is feeling, then you can think about meaning in a more prescriptive sense and his work starts to make more sense. I would probably have a wildly different experiencing reading it now than when I originally read it.

I had a childhood where my feelings did not matter very much. My dad was a narcissist and my mom was too busy bread-winning. This resulted in suppression of emotions since they had very little value. As an adult the lessons learned as a child are carried through.

Childhood emotional neglect is the state of not learning how to have purpose because you don't matter. The depression stage of grief seems closer to the state of having lost meaning.

I guess for a summarized critique of Frankl, it's that much like the article posted is saying, meaning is not a linear monolothic idea. If you frame the conversation around meaning as Frankl's book does, that's a very different conversation than one framed around emotional regulation. The emotional regulation conversation helps find meaning, but the meaning conversation is unlikely to help a person with emotional regulation.

[skyung421]

I agree with you on that there is no clear definition or discussion about "meaning" itself. But I don't agree with the idea that meaning == feeling. It sounds to me that if I apply that definition to how I live my life it'd only leads to a hedonistic one that only pursues momentary satisfaction of my feelings.

[endorphine]

Don't know about `==`, but I take parent's comment as: you intuitively know that you have found meaning, because of the way you _feel_ when doing/thinking certain things, like playing with your child, working on a project, running, reading a book etc.

If I feel content while doing something, then that something gives me meaning.

[manmal]

> For you "meaning" seems to mean something. For me "meaning" was a null pointer exception.

No it’s the same for me. The thing is that I don’t care at all about that when I’m well. I haven’t thought about the meaning of life for a year probably (ok I’m very busy). When I was in a bad place (also was raised by narcissists), I obsessed over meaning and purpose all the time. But that’s just a symptom of depression IMO. Like I said, my take is that the search for purpose is a proxy for concrete problems that need solving. Something that the conscious part comes up with that feels like finding a solution to would make us feel better.

[endorphine]

I think you hit the nail on the head. The childhood you're describing resonates with me.

Have you found ways to overcome or manage the effects of that neglect?

> The emotional regulation conversation helps find meaning, but the meaning conversation is unlikely to help a person with emotional regulation.

I guess you meant "[...] to help a person _without_ emotional regulation"?

Can you expand on this? Are you suggesting the lack of emotional regulation is what prevents people from finding meaning (whatever that means)?

[hayst4ck]

> Have you found ways to overcome or manage the effects of that neglect?

No, but I haven't tried professionals or medication. I watched a number of Stanford lectures on psychiatry and while I was rabidly against medications (unless they had a street value because that indicates they do something that people value), I found the lectures pretty convincing and they changed my mind. Sapolsky in particular has some great lectures.

> emotional regulation

That's a fun bit of ambiguity. Am I saying help a [person with emotional regulation] or help a [person] with [emotional regulation]? I meant help a person regulate their emotions.

Running on empty talks about it. I can't say I am sold on her treatment protocol which involves work including writing reflections focused on bringing attention to emotions and being able to better describe them.

But yeah, blunted emotions and dis-regulation inhibit the ability to do work. It creates comfort seeking behavior rather than growth seeking behavior. If you can't imagine emotional payoff, how are you going to motivate work? Not work like a job, but work like learning to read sheet music, or put yourself in social situations where you might face rejection.

I think the authors core idea was that emotional neglect as a child creates a situation were you de-value your emotions (because you don't want to burden a parent with them, for example), which creates suppression and blunting of emotions, which then manifests in all types of mal-adaptions which ultimately creates a situation where the fuel for life, emotions, isn't there and then you feel like you are "running on empty."

The author explicitly states that emotions are that fuel. Emotions are what prevents a person from feeling like they are out of fuel.

I think there is a class of people for which they are looking for "fuel" to their life, and I think that is the same thing as looking for "meaning."

> Are you suggesting the lack of emotional regulation is what prevents people from finding meaning (whatever that means)?

So taking the idea that meaning is emotions, lack of emotional regulation makes it hard to feel the feelings you want, which is nearly tautological.

So the question becomes "Do I have trouble finding meaning because I have suppressed my emotions?" I certainly figured out quite young that it's easier to stop wanting something than to seek it out and struggle or fail, particularly without help. Do I really not want the thing, or was my desire suppressed? Would there be meaning in me getting it? Would there be meaning in seeking it out? Even if I suppressed my desires, is that desire still there? Have I suppressed my desire for meaning because the work is onerous?

I am not sure if those are the right questions or what the answers are but I think they poke in the emotional regulation/work/meaning/emotions direction and start sketching a framework upon which to think about the problem.

I recommend her book. I thought it was going to be a slog, but 1-2 chapters in and I felt like I was reading my own biography, I read it in a day. It's pretty mechanical rather than wishy-washy. Most concepts are well defined and technical in nature. She doesn't make many appeals to intuition and everything is pretty "cause and effect".

[93po]

> unless they had a street value because that indicates they do something that people value

This usually only means that doctors restrict access to those drugs because they have a potential for addiction and abuse, and people seek them out on the street once they're addicted and their doctor has recognized this/declined to continue them on it/they want an abusable quantity. Exceptions for things like insulin which has other unique reasons.

Potential for abuse and addiction is not a good sign of value. It's a sign of it's potential to ruin or end your life.

[marcus_holmes]

There are lots of people who are unable to clearly feel emotion (Alexythemia). Are these people doomed to wander without purpose or meaning? Obviously not.

Emotions are fleeting, ephemeral, things that should definitely not be used to drive our lives. You can have 10 different, conflicting, feelings in 5 minutes (and for some of us this is a common occurrence).

Meditation allowed me to get past my random thoughts and emotions and achieve some semblance of coherence to my inner life. Detaching from my emotions has done more for me achieving any meaning in my life than following them.

Defining my values and using them to guide my life has created meaning for me. YMMV

[hayst4ck]

> Obviously not.

This is not obvious to me at all. I would expect trouble clearly feeling emotion to directly lead to struggle with meaning.

I am pretty sure this psychologist would agree: https://drjonicewebb.com/do-you-have-alexithymia/

Her book running on empty quite literally states that alexythemia is damaging to a feeling of purpose. She states alexythemia directly contributes to (1) emptiness and numbness, (2) suffering in silence, (3) questioning the meaning and value of your own life, and (4) escape fantasies.

[Mezzie]

I had medication induced alexithymia and since I've experienced both sides of it, I would add my voice to saying that having alexithymia causes major problems in finding purpose in life. Making any kind of decision was terrible; I couldn't decide what jobs to pursue, couldn't pick what hobbies to do, etc. I felt like crap physically because I couldn't feel any desire for food or other sustenance.

I also ended up with a drug problem because I tried drugs at this time and it was the only way I could feel anything and make choices.

[marcus_holmes]

Interesting.

I went through clinical depression and solved that partly through Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) [0], which has "The Happiness Trap" as its core text. The core idea of this (as you'd expect from the title) is that pursuing happiness as a goal is pointless and futile. ACT emphasises values over feelings as the core of meaning, and distancing oneself from one's feelings as a way to deal with them. There's considerable overlap with stoicism, which also de-emphasises feelings as a source of meaning (or anything). Both of these treat emotions as things to be treated carefully, as a probable source of misery and dis-ease, and not something to be embraced as one's core path to meaning.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acceptance_and_commitment_ther...

[Mezzie]

I've been depressed (but also not - I'm 'lucky' in that my depression is/has been situation based rather than innate/chemical). I think the problem with chasing happiness in particular is that it's kind of similar to chasing the high of a drug: It's not possible to be actively happy 100% of the time. I know in my depressive times one thing I liked to do was set myself impossible goals, and I think 'being happy' is one of them.

In my case, I needed to be more in touch with my emotions because I have severe dissociative issues and a very adversarial relationship with my own body, but I don't seek out any particular emotion. I see my emotions as data being passed to me from my lizard brain and I believe that to make appropriate decisions I must pay attention to all relevant data. In the same way that when planning an outing I must consider my physical capacity, when planning a goal or project I must also consider my emotional data. I try not to ascribe meaning to the emotions themselves, but I view them as invaluable indicators of meaning. If that makes any sense.

[hayst4ck]

I don't think these two things are necessarily incompatible.

"Emotions is meaning" is not "happiness is meaning", but that "feeling is meaning". I imagine that the acceptance in ACT involves allowing oneself to feel the feelings and understand them. I think Dr Jonice places most of her focus on this.

She makes it clear that feelings do not directly imply action, but that feelings imply relationship to a need, so understanding an emotion through the context of your needs helps inform the right action for the emotion.

She says neglect means your parents never helped you understand the relationship between emotions, meaning, and actions or never treated your emotions as valid and meaningful in the first place, resulting in suppression (she doesn't use the term experiential avoidance, but it sounds like the same idea).

> The core conception of ACT is that psychological suffering is usually caused by experiential avoidance, cognitive entanglement, and resulting psychological rigidity that leads to a failure to take needed behavioral steps in accord with core values.

It says it right here and this is consistent with her works. I think she would define "not emotions" or "not feeling" as experiential avoidance.

I imagine the approaches and techniques both schools would exercise are probably similar.

Honestly, reading what you wrote, without any real context of who you are or how you think, it sounds like you might still be experientially avoidant. I don't understand the difference between stoicism and experiential avoidance. "distancing" seems much different than "accepting," "embracing," or "treating as valid." But maybe words like distance mean different things to each of us.

I also am a total layman here, so I am probably ignorant.

I am not sure how a person would have values without emotions. I would expect values to be a product of emotions.

[hutzlibu]

"Finding meaning means seeing what makes you feel."

What about late stage cancer patients. They do feel pain. Does this mean, they find it meaningful to suffer till they die?

Or a mother that lost her only child, feeling now only misery?

So I would rephrase that to:

Finding meaning means doing what feels right.

So yes, in your specific case it meant, allowing yourself to feel again at all, to understand what you want to do.

I hope you manage.

[papandada]

I've been thinking about this comment for a few days now, just wanted to say thank you.

[qingcharles]

I really enjoyed reading this book whilst I was in jail. It made me feel a whole lot better about my situation.

[anonymouskimmer]

Except for the last two sentences, this seems like a non sequitur. It conflates value of one's self (meaning of life) with action by one's self (mission in life). The question was not "what's the meaning of what I do", but rather "what's the meaning of me". And the horrible corollary in this conflation yields "your life has no meaning" when you stop acting. "May as well pull the plug, as he has locked-in syndrome."

[nine_k]

The concept of self in general is a bit of exaggeration, and an immutable self that represents a person all their life is even more of an illusion.

If the self stayed unchanged, people won't even be able to develop through their lives, which is demonstrably not so.

So, with the "self", changes the idea of a meaning of life that appeals to that "self".

[anonymouskimmer]

Sure. Here I just meant it to be the being that is currently experiencing one's own existence.

[whitemary]

Nonsense. One's life meaning is traditionally simply their social role. The reason people lack meaning now is that we started determining our social roles by way of market whims, which means our roles are temporary at best and imaginary at worst. It also creates a market for braindead individualist philosophizing to explain why everyone feels so lonely and lost. Sterile precarity is the problem, not the solution.

[Juliate]

Having your social role defined by tradition (that is, really, what other people thought it should be) is not much good either.

[aaronblohowiak]

The context in which frankl wrote this was as a concentration camp survivor, quite different than the postmodern capitalist lends you seem to be evaluating it through

Notably, man’s search for meaning was 1946 iirc and postmodernism didn’t really ascend until some time later

[anonymouskimmer]

I don't agree with this approach at all, but even accepting what I think are its foundations, this seems to be conflating "social role" with "employment". Unless I misunderstand.

[whitemary]

Before employment, there was only social roles. In other words, they should absolutely be conflated. It is absurd and foolhardy to attempt separating them.

[anonymouskimmer]

> we started determining our social roles by way of market whims

Plenty of social roles are still not determined by market whims. Such as friendship and family relations.

[andrewjl]

> One's life meaning is traditionally simply their social role. The reason people lack meaning now is that we started determining our social roles by way of market whims

John Stuart Mill noted that liberalism leaves the determination of social roles to individuals because the end result drives more progress than the alternatives.

> Sterile precarity is the problem, not the solution.

What to do instead? Non-sterile precarity as in feudalism?

[fogzen]

We can choose our social role. We can choose the market we want to serve.

[worthless-trash]

We always choose the god we serve, even if its not a god.

[throw0101b]

What is your highest good (summum bonum)? This is what you worship.

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Summum_bonum

* https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06640a.htm

[worthless-trash]

I like how you put that.