MagsJ
First of all, let me thank you for some of my recent inspiration to write - your concise thoughts have led to a cogitation explosion. Second of all, I want to give you a heads up that I have not paid the usual attention that I do to sentence structure - reason being - I just wanted to let the thoughts flow and see what came out.
I agree . . . everybody has their own agenda . . .
I guess years ago, our own agenda might have been less than that of the local community’s agenda - just a thought. Having not lived that far back, I can not really say but I can say this - spending my high school years in a small community where everybody knew each other, felt very wholesome - what I mean by this, might have little to do with meaning though. I can say that throughout my adult life, there have been times where my high school years felt more meaningful than any arbitrary moment thereafter. Right now I am considering whether nostalgia plays a small part in providing meaning to us.
Namely… self-survival.
Regarding self-survival; I imagine we are talking somewhat above physical survival. Meaning helps to reassure oneself in a confusing world that their own life means something. I wonder what living in a smaller tribe would have been like, whether the residents of that tribe found more meaning in life than we do. The larger the settlement(village, town, city etc.) the less meaningful one feels.
Looking back . . .
When we get to a ripe old age, I can imagine whatever meaning we have gained from life to be high on the list of best company. I have spent many an hour listening to an elderly person speaking of old times - I have received much enjoyment from these precious moments. I ponder whether the meaning might be so important to us that if in the event, we consider that we might not have gotten everything out of life that we were working to achieve, then meaning kicks in to save us from any disappointment we may feel.
Self-serving process . . .
Of course it is difficult for me to ignore what you wrote regarding an input and output connected to a self-serving process, that becomes interrupted - first because I like processes - secondly because I wonder whether the process is actually ever interrupted or whether it is only interrupted on a conscious level. I must say however it certainly feels like meaning is put on hold at times and our desire to get it back increases through these periods.
When we leave it for too long . . .
In this post I would like to add to my comment from before, about hope, that despite the things that interrupt our individual searching to find meaning that we are able to hold onto any precious meaning gained :: I will add that if left for too long, the maintenance of self-survival(related to personal meaning), can lead to one truly losing oneself in a ocean of meaninglessness - that is my observation of people - they may indeed have meaning but it seems it does not glow from them like some people - I can just see meaning in some peoples eyes.
Pretty words and my rambling . . .
…and pretty words from you in return, ED Thank you MagsJ, I think your words are better - not only are your words pretty but they are more succinct than my own. I could not really help myself this time around but to keep typing - apologies if I became too long winded for your liking.
Indeed . . . and sad but true. Meaning comes at a price - we invest many years and dollars to make our lives meaningful and before you know it, the world has changed and what we have achieved becomes meaningless, or less impressive to those around us and perhaps even ourselves. Your comment also makes me think about tradition - in that it is quite possible that tradition while may not providing a full meaning to some, is at least a basic asset to building ones own meaning off of. I can assure you that I will be putting more thought into global social-unrest.
[size=85]I will call this section: When meaning seems lost . . .[/size]
I have really gained from this interaction. Thank you. I can now consider how meaning drives our personality. How our personality can be watered down or diluted among the social noise of our respective environments - how it is that we become shells of people rather than humanely wholesome. How the “meaning process” is always running in the background and needs to be brought to the foreground periodically for reflection to maintain our conscious awareness of it - how this periodic reflection allows our personal meaning to shine through our personality. Finally, meaning I believe, is strongly attached to communication - our desire to talk/communicate and ask questions.
It should be interesting where all of this takes us . . .