The Emptiness Within: The Anxiety of Finding Meaning
What matters is not the length of the radius of your activity, but how fully you fill the circle it creates. Viktor Frankl
Why human beings are in this world and what they are doing here are questions that have been pondered for a very long time and studied extensively. Our thoughts about why we are in this world, our search for meaning, can actually be described as a crisis we experience simply because we exist. We can see this crisis in parents whose children have all married or moved to another city for university, in a young person who has just graduated, in an adult whose life has settled into a routine, and in married couples. What is the meaning of life? What am I living for anyway? Why am I alive? What am I doing? What is the meaning of my life? How does a person find their own meaning, one that will make them satisfied and happy with their own life?
Many different thinkers have offered many different approaches and methods regarding the questions above and the meaning of our lives. We wanted to bring these approaches together and focus on how we actually apply them in our daily lives. The approaches to our search for meaning in life include:
An Indifferent World. Sartre said, 'Man's birth is meaningless, his death is meaningless, and within this meaninglessness there is a life that exists by chance,' and he argued that this meaninglessness can be overcome with dignity. He described the paths that can be followed in this dignity and search for meaning as building a home, friendship, helping others, freedom and commitment.
'Where to?' asks Electra, and Orestes answers: 'To ourselves.'
Altruism. Helping and supporting others is of great importance in finding the meaning of one's own life. If you have volunteered at a charity for even one day, you will have felt a well-earned sense of pride and fulfilment at the end of that day. The belief that giving, helping others and making the world a better place for others is good is a true source of meaning.
Creativity. Being creative and producing something also awakens the sense of beauty and fulfilment that comes with something new. A creative and careful approach to learning, cooking, studying and indeed to life contributes to a person's life. Which of us doesn't complain about routines, monotony and sameness, and about what we do feeling meaningless as a result? Developing a different perspective and a creative attitude toward our work will bring meaning with it. At the same time, the creativity we put not only toward ourselves but toward making the world a better place is where helping others and creativity overlap, and this is fulfilling.
Enjoyment. Living life to the fullest, enjoying every moment, keeping interest, curiosity and wonder toward life and what it brings and, most importantly, seeking pleasure in the meaning of life form the basis of this approach. It focuses on enjoying whatever we do.
Self-Actualization. It is said that a person's fundamental source of meaning lies in realizing themselves and their potential. Accordingly, it is noted that when we look back on a life spent without using our potential and abilities, a life not really lived, we will feel guilty and then fall into a sense of meaninglessness. We can see this in the guilt we feel when we say, "I wish I had done that too," or "I wish I had helped in that way when I could," sensing that we had the potential but failed to use it. Of course, for someone who feels their life has passed by empty and without finding themselves, what matters is not to regret the past years but to strive, from now on, to realize themselves and use the potential they have.
Self-Transcendence. The more a person worries about finding meaning in life and realizing themselves, the further they move away from it. In fact, this meaning comes when the individual shifts their focus from themselves to the world. For example, in a group of people you have just met, the more you focus on your own thoughts and words, the weaker your communication with others becomes and the less you enjoy the conversation. In such a situation you are so focused on yourself and on not making mistakes that you don't even hear the other person. A similar cycle applies to the meaning of life. The more we focus on ourselves, the more our frame fills with ourselves. But if we bring our surroundings, others and the world into the frame, we place goals that go beyond ourselves at the centre: our family, poverty, global warming, animal rights and so on. In this way, we focus on things that contribute to the world.
According to the Austrian psychiatrist Viktor E. Frankl, what human beings need is to strive and struggle for a goal that is valuable to them. He emphasizes that this goal must be directed toward something outside oneself. He also says that the purpose of life cannot be things like pleasure or being happy. The more a person pursues happiness, the more it will elude them.
Pleasure should not be the ultimate goal. Pleasure is a by-product, a gift, of a person's search for meaning.
Frankl stated that another important point in finding the meaning of life is the attitude a person takes toward suffering and situations they cannot change. He described this through his personal experiences in the Auschwitz concentration camp in his book 'Man's Search for Meaning'. The experiences he wrote on scraps of paper he found in the camp, and his thoughts on the role of meaning in psychotherapy, allowed him to withstand every kind of hardship there, to support others and to keep working toward the goal he had. It is a beautiful example of how surviving extreme and difficult conditions depends on being able to find meaning in one's suffering. In the concentration camp, Frankl aimed to finish his book and develop a therapy approach; other people in the same camp aimed to be reunited with their families, to take revenge, or to make the world aware of the hardships they endured, and they survived. According to Frankl's experiences, those who could not cope with life and the harsh struggle of the camp were mostly people who had no expectations of life.
On our journey of finding ourselves and seeking meaning in our lives, we may not always reach the goals we set. But once a sense of meaning develops, values form on their own. Our values are the principles that tell us what kind of life to live, and even if we don't reach the goal (there are many things in life we can't control), living by values in line with that goal makes us feel we are leading a meaningful life. Frankl might not have survived that camp, and he might not have written the book he aimed for or built the therapy approach he planned. But even if he had not written that book, he would have lived a full life guided by his values until the very end.
Our search for meaning is something that will be with us at every moment of our lives. Meaninglessness gives rise to feelings of emptiness, reluctance and joylessness, and at such a point it is impossible to get much out of life. That is why setting a direction in life and finding a purpose connects us to life and the beauty it brings. As a result, we free ourselves from feelings of joylessness, and when we look back we see that we have lived a fulfilling and satisfying life. What adds meaning to our lives is enjoying the journey toward our goals. The goal, happiness and pleasure are the gift at the end of the road, and we can never determine whether we will receive it. But we can determine what kind of road we will travel on the way to that goal. The meaning of my life cannot be getting rich, living abroad, the end of Corona or, if I am in isolation, getting out of it. That is meaningless and shallow. The meaning of my life should be to use the conditions I am in in a way that is good for me. Perhaps not getting rich, but striving for work that will help me grow and allow me to help others. Maybe wealth will come in the end, who knows, but that is not in my hands. If Frankl had set leaving the camp as his goal, he would have thought every day about how hard the camp was, how his time was passing wasted and aimlessly, and how his life was slipping away. But with a different goal, he found ways to fulfil himself even in that camp.
You may not be enjoying your life, your circumstances or the current state of the world. You may feel an emptiness and a sense of meaninglessness inside. But you have the power to make the best use of your circumstances and to shape yourself in line with your values. Wherever you are, as long as you take responsibility for your life, you are free. We are free. It's a wonderful feeling.
References:
Frankl, V. (2013) İnsanın Anlam Arayışı. İstanbul, Okuyan Us Yayınları.
Yalom, I. (2018). Varoluşçu Psikoterapi. İstanbul, Pegasus Yayınları.
