How to Live a Meaningful Life

The meaningful life is to live life meaningfully. This quote initially carries with it a concise profundity,
and yet upon further consideration, it fails to tell us very much about what it is to live meaningfully.

So, how could we come across things that fill our hearts with meaning, that guide our focus to what
we will find most important and worthwhile in our lives? The answers to such questions are
especially crucial nowadays, when the average person is easily disillusioned, disturbed by feelings of
purposelessness, anhedonia, and hopelessness.

One individual who arose from the depths of concentration camps and spent his years studying the
very notion of meaning may offer an answer. Viktor Frankl, an Austrian psychologist who survived
both Dachau and Auschwitz, wrote extensively about his personal encounters with man's search for
meaning after the war. Despite the fact that nearly all hope was lost in such situations, Frankl
observed that individuals found meaning in three ways - the creative, the experiential and the
attitudinal.

The creative, the dimension that we would likely consider the most obvious as a facilitator for
meaning, deals with achievements and accomplishments. Namely, we find meaning through that
which we give to the world. Perhaps one finds meaning as a painter, capturing the complexity of the
human condition on canvas. Or perhaps one creates wonderful dishes, finding just as much joy in
cooking as they do in eating. The creative dimension, in this era of cheap and constant consumption,
pushes and motivates us to give a little as well.

The experiential component asks us what we take from the world. The second way of finding
meaning in life according to Frankel is by experiencing something such as goodness, truth and
beauty. By experiencing nature, culture, or last but not least by experiencing another human being
in his very uniqueness, by loving him. This call for greater openness may involve a trip to the
museum, a walk in the park, or even a moment of silent gratitude for the ones you love.

Finally, the attitudinal dimension is namely the attitude we take towards unavoidable suffering.
Frankl firmly believed that when we are unable to change a situation, all we can do is change
ourselves. While Frankl makes it clear that suffering is not necessary for a meaningful life, he
recognizes its ever-present potential as a vessel for reflection and self-transformation. Nowadays,
with constant news of environmental disasters and geopolitical conflict, this final way to find
meaning is needed now more than ever. We must recognize such events as a call to find meaning in
the suffering.

If one wishes to embark on more meaningful living, I encourage them to reflect on Frankl's
trichotomy - the creative, that which we give to the world; the experiential, that which we take from
the world; and the attitudinal, the stand we take when the world kicks us down.