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What are you living for?

Posted: June 8th, 2018, 10:25 am
by ReasonMadeFlesh
What reasons do you have to go on living? What gives your life meaning and purpose?

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 9th, 2018, 6:33 pm
by Father
Some people live for god, and worship the Bible, some people live for ideals, such as justice or kindness, and some people just choose to cease living altogether. But I would say that I live for money, and for my brother. Those are the two things that have always allowed me to get back up in life.

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 9th, 2018, 7:24 pm
by Sy Borg
I don't need a reason to live. That's a given - I'm alive until I am not. However, I sometimes need reasons to do what I do while I am alive.

On the grander level (not that I think that's necessary to lead a great life) I like to see all life and non-life as part of an evolving chain of existence, from which sentience has emerged and will develop over time, if not on Earth*, somewhere in the universe.


* Should catastrophe occur relating to climate change, nuclear winter, supervolcano eruptions or major asteroid strikes.

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 9th, 2018, 8:15 pm
by JamesOfSeattle
I’m dancing my role in the dance, reveling in my part, and trying to understand where it’s going.

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 10th, 2018, 2:25 am
by Belindi
ReasonMadeFlesh wrote: June 8th, 2018, 10:25 am What reasons do you have to go on living? What gives your life meaning and purpose?
I can usually think of something.

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 10th, 2018, 2:41 am
by LuckyR
ReasonMadeFlesh wrote: June 8th, 2018, 10:25 am What reasons do you have to go on living? What gives your life meaning and purpose?
The reasons border on the infinite. Way, way too many to list here.

Look at it this way: you have the rest of eternity to be dead (probably billions if not trillions of years), but only at max 120 years to be alive. What's the rush to be dead?

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 10th, 2018, 4:10 pm
by chewybrian
I do the best I can for family and friends, but success there is always uncertain. But, there is one girl I know I can do right by:

Image

For myself, I live for tranquility and growth. I think forward progress is more likely to come from inside than from externals like money and stuff.

But, as someone who's worn a leisure suit, I think the best tattoo I can give my future self is no tattoo. In other words, leave the door open to the idea that what is important now might seem silly in the future.

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 10th, 2018, 4:30 pm
by ThomasHobbes
1. my partner
2. my son
3. my dog
4. myself
4a, doing art
4b, helping others do art.

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 11th, 2018, 3:33 am
by Belindi
Chewybrain, I like your doggy girl. And your basic uncertainty.

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 11th, 2018, 4:30 am
by Burning ghost
Trying to figure out the purpose of meaning and the meaning of purpose. Consciously or not we all do this, so why not actually make a concerted effort to help this natural process along?

The approach I use is basically a willingness to confront fears and anger with caution and persistence. Giving up is better than not trying at all. Who knows what is out there for us to learn?

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 11th, 2018, 6:39 am
by chewybrian
Belindi wrote: June 11th, 2018, 3:33 am Chewybrain, I like your doggy girl. And your basic uncertainty.
Thanks; she is awesome.

I get called "Chewy" because of my wookie-like appearance. But, it's not really "brain". Although... my brain does become like taffy sometimes when I come to this place, so maybe it works just as well.

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 14th, 2018, 8:48 am
by ReasonMadeFlesh
chewybrian wrote: June 10th, 2018, 4:10 pmFor myself, I live for tranquility and growth. I think forward progress is more likely to come from inside than from externals like money and stuff.
I know.
chewybrian wrote: June 10th, 2018, 4:10 pmBut, as someone who's worn a leisure suit, I think the best tattoo I can give my future self is no tattoo. In other words, leave the door open to the idea that what is important now might seem silly in the future.
Me too.
Lucky R wrote:As usual... it depends.
I love your signature btw.

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 14th, 2018, 10:56 am
by LuckyR
chewybrian wrote: June 11th, 2018, 6:39 am
Belindi wrote: June 11th, 2018, 3:33 am Chewybrain, I like your doggy girl. And your basic uncertainty.
Thanks; she is awesome.

I get called "Chewy" because of my wookie-like appearance. But, it's not really "brain". Although... my brain does become like taffy sometimes when I come to this place, so maybe it works just as well.
My first roommate in college was a Brian, he got that a lot.

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 15th, 2018, 5:28 am
by Dachshund
Greta wrote: June 9th, 2018, 7:24 pm I don't need a reason to live. That's a given - I'm alive until I am not. However, I sometimes need reasons to do what I do while I am alive.
Greta,

I agree. Human beings do not need reasons ( logical, rational, etc; type reasons) to regard life as being worth living (and insulate themselves, for instance, from the distress of chronic suicidal ideation, or indeed the actuality of attempting - successfully or otherwise to take their own lives) but they do, generally speaking, need to have values. To value something is not just to desire it. In valuing something I desire it but I also (somehow) judge that something ought to be desired. The word "ought", in turn, connotes an expression of justice - of moral rightness. In sum, If I believe that something ought be desired, then I am assuming that the world ought be a certain way; moreover, I only feel that the world ought be a certain way if it is not that way already. Thus, having values means that we feel that the world ought be different from the way that it is. And this, I think, is how most of us look upon the world most of the time (?)

The other way to view the world is from a strictly scientific, objective, amoral perspective. If we adopt the outlook of a scientist and endeavour to see the world strictly as is IS, that is, as a place wholly divested of all values; that is, one that is comprised solely of matter and energy, where mindless particles interact in predetermined ways, and there is no reason to expect that human beings are any exception to the laws of science, then we naturally experience an acute sense of absurdity. This is because when we adopt a strictly objective worldview that looks at things quite simply as they are, values become irrelevant. But in a worldview stripped of values there seems to be no meaning or purpose to anything that we do. There is nothing to motivate us to do one thing rather than another, and we are inevitably left to ask ourselves: "What's the point of doing anything"? This question is essentially a recognition of absurdity, a recognition that, from at least one perspective, there is no point in doing anything - that life is utterly meaningless.

My point is that the fact we (I human being) have values is a very interesting and important aspect of our existence. For me, it is one quite distinctive feature of our fundamental/essential human nature; one that we can can perhaps (?) "tag and label", metaphorically speaking, and use to further progress our metaphysical enquiries into the profound - and largely unfathomed mystery - of our true( human) being as such ?

What do you think ?

Re: What are you living for?

Posted: June 15th, 2018, 11:21 am
by LuckyR
The title as written isn't: why are you alive? Or: for what purpose are you alive? It is: what are you living for? A very different (if somewhat related) thing. The first two are philosophical in nature, the actual question is merely an opinion.