Looking for Meaning
Many bright people live in a world devoid of meaning. By avoiding the devoid, they even get more and more in a strut. How to get out?
This is an important text to me…
and to you, dear reader, for one plain reason: without meaning, there is no meaning… of anything.
Meaning is related to depth.
Meaning is related to the subconceptual.
At the purely conceptual level
there is no meaning possible. If one says: the meaning of concept Y lies in concept X, what is then the meaning of concept X? One keeps looking for meaning as in a look-up table. That would be meaningful if one would, for instance, end up at concept A which would be truly meaningful.
But then I would ask: why?
– “Because I say it’s meaningful.”
Why do you?
There is no way
of getting beyond concepts in purely conceptual thinking. And ‘meaning’-as-a-concept is just not about the conceptual, at least not as I’m using this term and as you might have guessed.
This meaning is being lost in many scientific domains because that’s a world prone to concept-ualize everything.
Conceptualizing is OK where it’s OK.
Conceptualizing may have bad consequences where it’s not OK. [see: “Other Consequences”]
So, how to get out?
Perhaps by using scientist’s schemes: conceptualizing the subconceptual.
Well, I’m trying to do so as much as I can. Still, I encounter scientists who are ‘resistant’ to anything that could open their house of concepts. Outside of that house, they feel very uncomfortable to the point of – almost – losing rationality itself.
So, how does one find deeper meaning?
By finding it, of course. Which is: by experiencing it. Eventually, one is the other.
Experiencing is a here-and-now event. It’s about poetry, about art, being in nature, being in relationships, etc.
Hm. For instance, physicians see lots of patients but what many of them really see too much are diseases, prognoses, etc.
No depth. No warmth. No meaning in the job. Burnout.
Meditation
is according to me a nice way to reach deeper layers of meaning.
A lot of different stuff is being called ‘meditation’. One of them – my take on it – is centered on deeper contact with oneself. That’s also the goal of the 1000+ AURELIS health meditations.
It is my attempt to bring some meaning.
Related Posts
To Be Meaningful
To be meaningful is the most basic human drive. It reaches deeper than pleasure or success, even deeper than survival. Without meaning, life feels like non-being, like a silence where no resonance arises. This need, so often frustrated, lies at the heart of many fractures in both individuals and societies. To understand it is to Read the full article…
In Mind-Matters, We’re still Pre-Science
Well, mostly. Unfortunately, as we were still pre-science in body-matters 250 years ago, we still are in mind-matters today. In healthcare 250 years ago, practices like bloodletting, enemas, and the theory of four humors were prevalent. There was some science in that pre-science era, but it was pretty limited. Note that in this blog, ‘mind’ Read the full article…
Anxiety
People who apparently feel little anxiety, quite often turn out to harbor a lot, arguably more so in Western cultures. The latter may seem so because it strikes me more. [See in AurelisOnLine: Anxiety] Anxiety, not fear Fear is conceptual. The object of fear is mostly well delineated. One can say: It is mechanical, directly Read the full article…