2002-05-18 4:18 p.m.
May I have something to live for, please?
OK, I have no idea why this is pressing on my mind right now, but it is, so I'm gonna write about it:
The meaning to life. I suppose, like many others, that I have been wondering about this for several years. What is the meaning to life, the point to it all? I've talked a little about this in my 'What's the Point?' essay on my website, but what I'm focusing on here is the goal, the highes thing that we strive for, the thing that keeps us living.
I'm at the point in my life where I'm realizing that there has got to be something that inspires us to keep living day after day. And not just something that inspires us, but something that in and out of itself, IS a reason to live. I know that many people choose some type of religion as their meaning to life, but I want to know what void is it that exists in our lives that we use religion to fill. Is it the need to be happy? Is it the need for love? Or is it merely the need to have meaning in our lives?Religion fills all of these needs. SO, maybe the ultimate purpose to life is to be happy? or to love? or to find meaning?
I can't decide what to live for. I don't know what to make my ultimate goal, for I don't know the goal to life itself. Should I live to find happiness? Is this what I should strive for in all things? Doing whatever makes me happy? But if so, what is happiness? We can choose to make ourselves happy and if we are able to be happy in any situation, then happiness would be freely available and not pose as an unachieved goal we are still striving for.
Should I live to love others and to find love? This idea seems so popular in movies like Moulin Rouge, 'The only thing is just to love and be loved in return.' But, is this the only thing? If love were truely the meaning to life, then why aren't we all just sitting around telling everyone how much we love them all day long? Why do we often sacrifice love and relationships to accomplish other things? Love (like happiness) is a great thing, but it seems like there is more that pushes us on.
Should I then live for the search for meaning? Should the fact that I haven't found meaning yet be the thing that makes me keep going everyday? It that the point to it all? To try and find the meaning? If so, then this life (to put it as simply as possible) SUCKS!! The point to it all is to continue in circles always searching for something that isn't really there??!!! How can this be? It kind of takes away the drive to live knowing that the meaning can never be found.
I am still lost without a meaning and I still wonder why I should keep myself going. It's hard, sometimes I want to just curl up in a ball and die so I don't have to think about it right now. But I can't, and I won't. But I also can't ignore the fact that I feel so purposeless and that life itself is so unfufilling.
What do I want? I want answers. I want purpose. I want to know why I so desperately have the desire to find meaning.
I want something to live for.
Thursday, Aug. 03, 2017 - hello?Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014 - strange dream
Monday, Oct. 06, 2014 - catholic and friends
Thursday, Sept. 04, 2014 - changing. and I need to go to bed.
Saturday, Aug. 30, 2014 - dreams of dying
Chapters of My Life
Motherhood
Sept. 2011 - now Being a mother.
Isolation&Infertility (&pregnancy)
Aug. 2009 - Sept. 2011 Working from home in a job that I love...that comes with a loneliness I hate. A husband who works too much, and continued failure to start a family. Slowly spiraling, forgotten, into social invisibility. Accepting and experiencing the potential of pregnancy.
First-Year Teacher
Aug. 2008 - Aug. 2009. pretty much the hardest job I hope I ever have. and all the while trying not to admit my secret turmoil over longings for/attempts at/failure to produce what's supposedly supposed to come after love and then marriage...
Optimism
Aug. 2007 - Aug. 2008. finally accepting that becoming a normal grown up is not just inevitable, but preferable. better job situations for both of us. working freelance as a studio teacher, and becoming an egg donor.
Fading Dreams...
Dec. 2006 - July 2007. student teaching, being poor, consistent job rejections, trying to save face while feeling hopeless.
To Live a Life Worth Death...
July 2006 - Nov. 2006. thinking about death a lot, accepting life and my eventual end. career and passions - beginning the path of contribution to what I will leave behind...
Identity Crisis/Marriage
Oct. 2005 - Apr. 2006. new job. new career. new last name. new husband. new life. who was I and what was I becoming?
The Official End to Childhood? II
June 2005 - Sept. 2005. preparing for a life that still felt like pretend. was I really a 'grown-up' already? weird.
The Official End to Childhood? I
Feb. 2005 - June 2005. losing my virginity, getting engaged, changing my career, selling our childhood home...slowly losing everything that held me as a child... (Meet Mr. Mom 4/05 - 5/05. working/travelling on production of my 4th & LAST reality show ever.)
Quarter-Life Crisis/Unemployment
Sept. 2004 - Feb 2005. no steady job for 5 months - definitely not a good place to be. oh, and I fell in love - which is a good place to be, but it kind of only adds to the confusion.
Postlude to the Prelude
Apr. 2004 - May 2004. I had no clue what things were being set in motion...but everything has changed from there.
The Simple Life 2
Mar. 2004-Apr. 2004. not the deepest thinking period of my life, but I learned a heck of a lot about production of a reality tv show.
L.A. #2 - The Real World
Aug. 2003-Feb. 2004.the big move. transplanting my life. ironically not only working in the "real world", but also AT the company that makes The Real World.
That Weird, Here Nor There, Summer
May 2003-Aug. 2003. a college graduate, but not yet in the grown-up world. just existing. and waiting. and thinking.
Goodbye College
Jan. 2003-May 2003. it's a weird thing, the last semester of college. lots of thinking about what lies beyond.
The Semester From Hell
Aug. 2002-Dec. 2002. it was kind of like I tried to cram 4 yrs. of growing-up experiences into one semester.
I've Changed?
Apr. 2002-Aug. 2002. after L.A. and stuck right in-between the two most intense "finding-myself" semesters of my life!
L.A. #1 - Interning/Discovering
Jan. 2002 - Apr. 2002. I finally stepped WAY outside my comfort zone and went where I had no freakin idea what I was doing. Living outside your bubble for awhile really makes you see differently.
Beginnings/Depression
Aug. 2001-Jan. 2002. who I was, and sometimes who I still am. how it started and how it was before.