Before going any further or reading the articles in the book complete the following task. Go somewhere you can think without distraction (somewhere comfortable and relaxing is best). Then take some time and ponder your response to the following questions: What is the meaning of life? Is your life meaningful? Why or why not? Are any lives meaningless? Why or why not? Once you have compiled your answers to these questions, write them up in a one page short essay and post them to the Module 1 Discussion Board. Don't read or comment on anyone else's essay until after you post yours!

(Mar 7, 2017)

The meaning of life? I am a 56 year-old man, and those are plenty of years to have pondered the answer(s) to the question. And though I've made considerable progress, I believe it is a never-finished journey if one chooses to really seek the truth.

Here is an excellent answer from my all-time favorite author Kurt Vonnegut Jr.-

"What is the purpose of life? To be the eyes, ears, and consciousness of the Creator of the Universe, you Fool!"

(The "fool" part comes in context of his novel Breakfast of Champions, which I highly recommend. Vonnegut wrote very honestly, in fact somewhat cynically, about life and death).

But I think that is basically what we are all doing here, and not just humans but every organism on this planet (and hopefully others scattered out there in the cosmos). You don't have to believe in a literal Creator; maybe every living thing contributes to a sort of universal consciousness. Or not. We don't really know, do we? But it would seem an awful lot of trouble, all the crazy hurdles of existence we deal with, if it were all for nothing. But it's not. Even if we just live once, and merely for its own sake, that is still a reason.

My life has been very meaningful. I've been lucky enough to have grown up in a loving family, and to have developed a life-long interest in learning, thanks to curiosity and some great teachers. I was "foolish" enough to follow a dream of being a professional musician after high school, and now almost 40 years later I can play just about anything I want to on guitar. I have loved, and lost, and loved again. Worked a very eclectic mixture of jobs. Been a parent. I've made a couple lifetimes worth of mistakes... And I really love to write. That is my dream for the latter years that I'm around: to publish some original works. Essays, poems, short stories, maybe even a novel.

To judge whether a life could be meaningless seems a tough call to me. There are certainly many instances where you have to wonder why there's so much injustice- babies born in circumstances where they will die of starvation or disease, or with deformities, mental deficiencies, abusive parents... I don't know about "meaningless" but many people never get the chance to experience the richer meanings of life, and that is a tragedy in itself.

If there is indeed any overseeing intelligence guiding this universe, (and there's nothing really to lose in assuming so) I would posit that all life has meaning. Because there is something to be learned from the mistakes as well as the successes. Maybe more.