Meaning

What is meaning? This is the question that drives people, whether they realize it or not. The people that do not realize that they live their lives in search of meaning are constantly looking for approval, accomplishment and the next step in their lives. So many people look outward for meaning. They look to their parents, to society, to media, to their friends, and to strangers for meaning. But rarely do they look within. When they do look within, it is only to see if something within themselves can correlate to someone else's version of meaning. And when they find it, they are overjoyed. They go to the gym and wrack their bodies, they go to school to get the degree to get the job to make the money. They hit on the opposite sex so that they can either get into someone's pants or provide the basis for a foundation in which he/she can marry and eventually have a baby. This is folly.

Is meaning relative? Perhaps, but I do believe that there are some absolute truths in the world. For one thing, meaning is not how much money you make, or having a girlfriend/boyfriend/wife/husband. It is being happy with yourself regardless of the outside world. We work so hard to please that “theoretical outsider” that we forget ourselves. Of course, this doesn't mean we should all get fat, lazy and rude. If society's definition of meaning is to be thin, hard-working and polite, it is not okay, as an epiphanic action, to go the total opposite direction when you are trying to please yourself and become fat, lazy and rude. Ask yourself this: are you really happy with who you are when you are fat, lazy and rude, or is being fat, lazy and rude a knee-jerk reaction to one's inner nonconformist attitude bubbling up from the surface for the first time? I think being at a healthy body type, working at something you love to do and being kind, is a standard of meaning that is universal. I dare anyone to refute this.

You might find joy, at first, with eating whatever you want and however much of it you want, but in the end, you are sowing the seeds of your own destruction. You do not want to do that. You might find joy, at first, at being lazy and not doing anything, but in this internationally capitalistic society, you will not survive, unless, of course, you win the lottery or are born rich. You might find joy, at first, in flipping the people you wanted to flip off for so long. But soon, it will become a habit, and you will be mean to everyone you meet, whether they deserve it or not. You will not be able to sleep at night living like this.

This world we live in is very obtuse. There is so much emphasis on certain things, and the acquisition of them, but the evidence that points toward these things proves, without a doubt, that it's not worth the time and effort to obtain them. The only things in life worth exerting oneself in obtaining are the things that come easily to oneself.

Let's look at finding a girlfriend/boyfriend. If you are attractive and you can have a girlfriend/boyfriend at the drop of a hat, then by all means, get one. But if you are not attractive by society's standards, then it is not worth all the trouble and the rejections you will receive in trying to obtain one: all the physical troubles and emotional pain. It is just not worth it. You are simply trying to be someone you are not, and you should give up. It's like if one of those attractive, dumb people tried to do something you are good at. No matter how hard they try, they will never, ever be half as good as you. So why try? No one is going to hire them when there are people like you around. Same thing applies to attractive people. No one is going to go out with you when there are more attractive people out there. It simply doesn't make sense. Don't even try. It's not worth it. All the idioms out there meant to coax normal, ugly people as they cry themselves to sleep every night: “there are plenty of fish in the sea”, and “there's someone for everyone” are simply untrue.

“There are plenty of fish in the sea.” This is a true statement, but untrue when applied to the metaphor that we are just like fish, and therefore, there is another fish that will mate with us, because the sea is huge, and there are an enormous number of fish. Okay, I will concede that this statement is half-true. Of the 6.91 billion people in the world, if one had the ability to go through each and every one of them to see if any of those people were attracted to him/her to the point of one of them becoming his/her girlfriend/boyfriend, then the statement “there are plenty of fish in the sea” would be true. However, it is impossibile for a human to go through such a screening process. We are, ironically, not fish; we are human and are limited to the tens or hundreds of people we interact with on a social level. Also, fish, being of less intelligent mind, will only have one variable when finding a mate: physical attraction. There are no societal, cultural variables in play when fish find a mate. It is so much harder for normal, ugly people to find mates than fish. So please, let's just nix this old adage simply because it's not true.

“There's someone for everyone.” This might be true, but it is clearly untestable. Like I wrote in the previous paragraph, there is no way to find that perfect someone for everyone simply because there are too many people, and too much ground to cover. So the actuality of the statement might be true; I'm not saying it is not. But the practical application of the theory makes the statement incredibly unuseful and virtually worthless.

Let's look at people with girlfriends/boyfriends/wives/husbands. Are they any better than the normal person with no girlfriend/boyfriend/wive/husband? No. Even from an aesthetic standpoint, they are no better. They are not even better-looking. Oftentimes I see wives and husbands who are very unattractive. They have let themselves go and are very fat. Why give up on being physically attractive after you have gotten married and have a kid? Your partner will more than likely cheat on you in some way: probably through popular media. At the least, men will look at porn and women will watch TV shows with handsome men in it. So even though you have acquired a wife or husband, you are back to, nay, worse off than the normal, ugly single person, for now you are even less physically attractive, and far less societally attractive because you have a child. Few people will involve themselves with people with children.

Let's look at what kinds of people acquire girlfriends/boyfriends/wives/husbands so easily while the normal people struggle. These people are always highly flawed people. Normal people are flawed, sure, but these people are highly flawed. They need other people or they can't survive or even think like a normal person. These people are the same people who cry out for approval not just in the relationship arena, but also in the professional arena, the familial arena, the friendship arena, and every other arena possibile. These people are a lot dumber and have a lot less self-esteem than normal people. It is not true when they say confident, tough people can take rejection. The opposite is true. If you are not confident you are going to get a job, then you won't be surprised when you don't get it. Whereas if you are confident you are qualified for a job, and you don't get it, it stings. You wonder why you didn't get the job, whereas the dumb, unconfident person wouldn't care because they weren't qualified to begin with. If you think highly of yourself, is that not confidence, happiness with one's self. Society's definition of confidence and the actual definition of confidence are two different things. Society's definition of confidence: possessing all the superficial, outside traits that make a person “seem” confident; seemingly unphased by rejection and negativity. The actual definition of confidence: being happy with one's self and sure of oneself; having no uncertainty about one's own abilities, correctness.

When people talk about people's confidence, when it comes to relationships, they reference society's definition of confidence -
possessing all the superficial, outside traits that make a person “seem” confident. They say, “when you walk up to a woman, be confident.” What do they mean by that? It means to possess all the superficial traits that make you seem confident to her. It doesn't mean to actually be confident in yourself. For if you are actually confident in yourself, then you're thinking that you are a fool for talking to some strange woman; why do you need another person to make you happy? You are already happy with yourself, so you don't need anybody else. Now that's confidence.

It is true what they say about people in “love.” They are all insane. Do you want to be insane? No. I thought so. Insanity is not a good thing. Do we want a world of 6.91 billion insane people? No. We need sane, confident, normal, smart people like us to make this world run and keep it alive for generations after we die. That's why we can not give in to the societal pressures of becoming insane, weak-minded and dependent on others for our own happiness, when we are perfectly capable of making ourselves happy.

The desire to be in a relationship – where does that come from? Is it “the need for love”? Is it “the need for completion”? Is it “just another step on the metaphorical societal ladder of life”? Or is it greed?

“The need for love”. Where does that come from? Western society is still largely dominated by the Christian Bible. In 1^st Corinthians, Chapter 13, Paul writes about how love is the most important thing in existence. I would agree. But people see this in a twisted light. They think this applies exclusively to eros love (erotic love), but clearly it does not. There are two other types of love that get totally ignored by proponents of eros: agape and philia. Since agape is God's love for us, there is nothing we can do to increase that. However philia is “brotherly” love, but I like to think of it as “neighborly” love and it applies to everything imaginable: males, females, animals, plants and even the planet. If you have philia, you are a lover. It does not matter that you do not have a sex partner. You are a lover. You have love. You are loved by God, and hopefully your love is reciprocated in some part by some of the things in nature you love. If you love your pet dog or cat, he/she will express his/her love back to you. Your love of the planet will reciprocate back to you by keeping you healthy.

“The need for completion.” When did people become incomplete? Did you come out of your mother's womb half-complete? Were you sawed off
down the middle of your skull through your body so that you came out with one arm and one leg? People do not need other people to become complete. Another person is not going to fill that void in your soul that begs to be filled. You will just end up a lonely husband or a lonely wife. Complete yourself. No one will complete you - not the Sports Illustrated swimsuit supermodel who has a PhD and MBA, feeds hungry people in Africa and is in love with you; not even the Calvin Klein underwear model who is also a lawyer and billionaire, volunteers at the soup kitchen and plays basketball with underprivileged, inner-city kids on the weekends. People are looking for God in people, and God simply does not exist there.

Relationships are “just another step on the metaphorical societal ladder of life.” We are conditioned from an early age, to force ourselves to do things we do not want to do. We have to have vaccine injections even though they're painful. In the same place, we have to have intrusive and embarrassing genital examinations by strangers. We have to go to school. We have to do this, and we have to do that. When have we ever done what we actually wanted to do? And when we finally decide to do something that we think that we actually want to do, is it actually something we want to do, or some knee-jerk reaction to doing something opposite or at least somewhat opposed to things we have been forced to do our entire lives? I think it's a mix of both. The more people told us we shouldn't do a specific thing, why did we go and rebel and do that exact specific thing? It's because we were told not to do that exact, specific thing. If we had been told not to do something else, we would have done that, instead of the other thing. So why do people get married? People get married because it is one of those things that people say we have to do. Why do over 50% of people get divorced? It is because they do not know what they want. They think they need to get married because society drills it into their heads over and over again that it is the logical next-step and a qualification to become a man or woman, but when they actually do get married, they realized it was not for them. But at least you got married the one time, right? You accomplished what you had to accomplish to feel like an adult climbing your invisible ladder. After you get a job, what is the fastest thing you can do to feel accomplished, or put another way, what is the easiest thing you can do that feels like an accomplishment? Marriage, of course. Retirement is still decades away, and if you have half a brain, children are also a ways off; marriage is the natural, easiest choice.

The desire to be in a relationship. Where does it come from? The most logical answer is greed. Does one need a girlfriend/boyfriend/wife/husband? No. Even the most stupidest, emotionally and financially dependent person on the planet does not need to be in a relationship. People are just greedy. They want, want, want. When one is single, are you in pain, agony and loneliness? If you are, you need to change the way you think. Society has altered the way you think to make you feel less than a man or woman if you are single. Defy that notion and ascend into a higher plane of thinking and being. Relationships are simply greed. What is greed? Being greedy is desiring something beyond what you need. Why do you need a girlfriend/boyfriend/wife/husband? You do not, so stop thinking that. People with girlfriends/boyfriends/wifes/husbands usually have everything else that society tells them to have as well: a job, money, and looks. So why do you need more? Relationships – both good and broken, are what is destroying this society we live in. How many murders occur because of heartbreak? By engaging in eros, people are destroying philia, so by the time the dust has settled, there is nothing but agape, but if one is not receptive to agape, he/she won't even feel it, so it might as well not even exist. We need to focus solely on philia, and that will change the world, for the better.

Many women claim they feel that “biological urge” to have children. I understand that. Men feel the “biological urge” to have sex with women in the same way. But what are these urges? Are they advanced, human urges or are they primitive, primal urges? We must ascend our animal instincts and go beyond what our bodies tell us to do. People think war is an advanced, human-like device, but it really is not. Insects go to war all the time: ants and termites do, thinking solely off the top of my head. Also animals war all the time, and I do not simply mean one-on-one combat for food and survival. Chimpanzee groups battle other chimpanzee groups, killing and even cannibalizing their victims. So we are no crueler than animals for warring with each other. It is immature and foolish for doing so, and far more immature and foolish for thinking we are advanced and “cool” for doing so.

When I look at husbands and wives together, I do not see them as being superior to me, although that's what society tells me they are. Technically, a husband was able to get a girlfriend, so he must be more of a man than I am. That is also false. I do not see that whatsoever. Also, if I see an attractive couple together, I do not think for one second that they are better than me. But society thinks if you are single and a virgin, you are less than a man, or woman. This is offensively false, and must change. You are no worse for being a single virgin. In fact, you are better, because you are not contributing to STDs, overpopulation and increased strain on the economy. Do what makes you happy and not what society makes you happy, and you will transcend into a higher plane of existence. Thank you, and have a good life.