What is the Purpose of Life
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You might have asked yourself what is the best way to spend the time of your life. It is one of the most important question you have to answer.
Unfortunately there is no specific answer i could give you, there is no specific action that would represent this, like I couldn't tell you that the purpose of life is to become a doctor. But there are some generalities like your motivation in the activities that you chose.
As far as i know you have three options you can either try to become successful, take some big risks and hope that is going to work out and become a self made man or women, whatever you might be pursuing that is usually fame or money, the second option is to live for pleasure and happiness all that risk taking and hard work might not be worthed after all life is short why waste it, so you prioritize pleasure and happiness, the third option is to try to minimize unnecessary sufferance that is created by humans.
We live in a world that over appreciates heroes, just look at all the superhero movies that had become popular lately. A hero is someone that is taking really high risks to accomplish what most people can't, not necessarily someone who is sacrificing their lives for others. I could argue that the heroic pursuit is rather selfish, a hero could be anything from someone who is famous to an entrepreneur or a warrior etc. This people are not being admired because they are necessarily helping others as much as they inspire others to be like them.
The motivation of the hero is not always a positive one, Hitler matches the definition of a hero for the people who voted him in power and fought for him or listened to his orders it was their hero. When you end up with something as bad as this, and the only benefit to others is to make then aspire to be just like you, you end up with a pretty accurate description of hell.
The problem with living for pleasure and happiness is that sometimes things that are pleasurable or make you happy can be very bad for you in the future or the people around you. For example if you are dictator keeping the entire country poor and starving with a lack of consciousness could make you very happy, it is only a matter of time until there will be a revolution, where the people you have torture for years for your own pleasure and happiness will kill you. In my experience the end is never happy when you are a hedonist. This is why hedonism is still a form of vampirism, it creates an unfair exchange and sufferance.
Not all sufferance is created by humans, life is hard by itself before people start doing dumb things. To it is impossible to avoid pain, failure, violence and death, so by default everybody will suffer.
But a lot of sufferance is created by other people, dedicating your life to reduce man made sufferance gives you an are of activities in which you could practice trading value with other people in a fair way. In trying to reduce sufferance you include the well beings of others in the success of your life. Like this it becomes a win/win trade you gain friends and resources and as a result of that the world becomes a better place because of you.
Thank you for a very thought provoking post!
As Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote:
What is success?
To laugh often and much;
To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children;
To earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends,
To appreciate beauty;
To find the best in others;
To leave the world a bit better, Whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition;
To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived;
That is to have succeeded.
Bottom line i am the purpose of life