Essays on Life - Part 5: On Notion of Purpose

Essays on Life - Part 5: On Notion of Purpose

Jack Nicholson's character in As Good as It Gets says: “And the fact that I get it makes me feel good about myself.”.

That line caught me, and to be honest, I used that trope many times in my life, appending it to different arguments to get what I wanted, material or otherwise.

It is a powerful idea, but we often fail to realize that it is all about ourselves. It is vanity talking, applauding, and appreciating vanity.

In my opinion, liberation is a three-step process, where the first two steps are not entirely well compartmentalized. But the third is way out there compared to the first two. Step one: awareness of externals. Step two is self-awareness. Step three is indifferent to everything.

The further argument is that it is this "step two" that is the most dangerous because it attempts to present means to fulfilling the self-aggrandizing need that comes out of Step 1.

The great sage Vishwamitra wanted to become a Brahma Rishi, and he acquired so many powers through penance. He realized his true potential. He was aware of other people and proceeded to comment on them, the same way we would like to about ants that scramble around our shoes on a warm winter afternoon. Step two brought Vishwamitra to Trishanku, and the former decided to transport the latter into Swarga through sheer power, thus fuelling the self-aggrandizing need of step one.

No points for guessing that the great sage failed, proceeded to define a new failed reality, fall in love, beget a child, abandon her, perpetuating her misery, and destroy his arduously accumulated powers. But he learned.

And then he reached the stage of being oblivious to all creation, which eventually made him the only Brahma Rishi of human origin. The man who manifested the Gayatri Mantra, which, legends suggest, even the gods couldn't comprehend in its entirety.

“Such visuals delight me, as does the joy of missing out on all the conversations that I now choose to avoid, because I have reached a place where I need to be at peace." May I submit that you are not at peace? Because if you were at peace, you would not be paying enough attention to things to register their effect on you.

The system presented a distraction, just like the girl in red was for Neo in the Matrix, and he succumbed to it.

Peace is not the absence of external stimuli. Peace is inaction in the face of external stimuli and then moving to the point of being completely oblivious to them.

“Everything is as pointless and meaningless or as meaningful and impactful as I deem it to be." The fact that you register that you are observing means that you are still in the experiment.

I know what I say is hard. I have been grappling with the same issues, and I have not found a way out. But I thought it was my duty to express what I realized, and I wish you the very best on the path of becoming oblivious to externalities. If you succeed, do tell me how.

Just so you know, I am still struggling with step one.

Which brings me to "purpose," or what I call the "principal intent of meaningful existence." I completely understand your search for that purpose. Malcolm Gladwell's book "Outliers" talks about this very idea. And its principal hypothesis is quite profound: that there is a direct implication of probability in our lives and success.

I, for one, have been amazed at the series of happy (and sad) coincidences that have occurred in my life, starting even before my birth (and thus paving the way for it to happen). And I say that with some kind of pseudo-scientific evidence.

A girl was born in the one-bedroom house next door to where I was born four hours earlier. She and I have managed to stay in touch to date. We had the same socio-economic background, the same profession of fathers (who happened to have the same educational background), were born in the same place almost at the same time (ruling out most of the exotic effects of astrology and stars), and the profiles of mothers were the same (both simple housewives). And yet, her life is diametrically different from mine in all aspects.

Therefore, the hypothesis based on my superficial and incorrect understanding of the world is that since I have been bestowed with such gifts, such abundance and such capabilities mean that I must do something with them. This implies that I must have a reason for existing. All this must have a purpose. 

The point I am trying to make in this rather clumsy rambling is: What if there is no purpose? What if this struggling and suffering that we experience in our lives serves no higher purpose?

Jordan Peterson talks about a scenario where a participant is called to play a game. And the bell rings to signify the start, but the participant just stands there because he doesn't know what the game is or what its rules are. If the participant wanted, he could have done anything, but he just stands there. Peterson argues that infinite power begets infinite inertia. When you are empowered to do anything, you actually do nothing.

If humanity bears resemblance to any fluid (due to its inherent fluidic properties), its motion can only occur when we introduce constraints. And my argument is that this self-created concept of purpose is a "constraint" that, on the one hand, satisfies our vanity and, on the other, allows us to move forward, to achieve, to propagate, and motivates us to continue this grandiose-yet-hollow expedition of finding meaning.

Have you ever noticed that all philosophies and ground-breaking studies and books on life and its meaning are written post-facto? Why so?

Which then begs the question: How do we live a purposeless existence? In my opinion, the answer is surrender.

Considered to be the most beautiful woman of her age, Draupadi was an unwanted child; never loved by her father; tricked into marrying five men; called a whore and abused; bargained off by her husbands; became the principal cause of the greatest destruction witnessed by mankind; lost her children; and yet she remained the same. In the epic, there are shlokas after shlokas about her beauty, powers, character, and charisma. And yet, in her final days, as she slips down the Himalayas to her death, only two words are used for the great Draupadi, "Nathavati Anathvat," whose husband is yet unprotected.

Draupadi realized and surrendered herself to the sacrificial fires of a holocaust, of which Krishna himself was the presiding deity. Her abandoning the idea of purpose allowed her to become an instrument that would bring an effete era to an end so that new beginnings could be made.

The very idea that all this good has happened to "me,” and hence “I” must do good to those that are not as fortunate as "I" am, is Neo's girl in red. The system stumped us again.