Purpose and Meaning

Audio Transcript

The question is: Can purpose and meaning really become one when we follow our heart’s desire, or do they always have to be opposite one another?

Very helpful question, because in this crisis of meaning and purpose where people one nice day wake up and have to admit, “my life is full of purpose but what’s the meaning of it all?” …in this situation, many people have said, “up to now I have been involved in nothing but purpose, let’s have a little meaning without purpose,” and then very soon they find that that doesn’t lead to anything either.

The two are intimately connected with one another. They can be distinguished but they cannot really be separated. And if we try to separate them it’s life-denying and destructive. So you’re perfectly right, they are closely interwoven with one another.

Whether we find this wholeness depends on whether we live from the heart. And when we live from the heart, we will try to achieve our purpose in such a way that we also find meaning in it. And that means that at the same time we firmly and clearly take things in hand but open our hearts to the meaning that flows into us.

And quite practically, quite concretely, think of something like washing the dishes. If you do the dishes, which I like to do but most people don’t particularly — most people like cooking and not washing dishes, I like washing dishes and not cooking, so I’m very popular at parties [audience laughter] — if you want to wash the dishes right, you have to give yourself to it. If you just do it to get it over with, then it’s really a purpose, let’s get that purpose over. It’s pretty sad if you do so many things in your life just to get them over with, imagine how much time you’re spending just getting things over with. But if you do the dishes as one does them say in the Japanese tea ceremony — where after all the art of washing the dishes is part of it — that you for instance lift up the heavy things as if they were featherlight, and all the light things as if they were real heavy… Try that sometimes when you wash your dishes and all of a sudden it becomes playful, and when it’s playful, that’s the essence of play, meaning flows into it. It’s not only purposeful, but it will be far more purposeful than it was before you did it better, more quickly, more leisurely and at the same time it will be meaningful. That’s how the two should be interwoven.