When people ask, "What is the meaning of life?" to themselves, they are typically asking what the meaning of their life is and how to really find meaning in their lives. Fortunately, the latter is much more clear and concrete than the former since life has the meaning that you assign to it.
And that's the secret. There is a word that describes when you assign meaning, significance, importance, or value to something: caring. Caring is the act of assigning meaning. When you care about something, it means something to you.
As such, there are two simple techniques to foster a sense of meaning in your life through the act of caring:
It’s really that simple because those are the only two things you can do: find something that you find meaningful or find meaning in things that you already know about. When you find something of interest in one of those two ways, you can then foster growth in that area or protect it from harm.
Why does that work? Well, the true meaning in life comes from growth: the fact that your life is better in some way today than it was yesterday. It’s why people find meaning in things like lifting weights, practicing a trade, or growing a business. There is also meaning in the inverse, protecting from harm, as shown in the military and police. But you can grow in many ways, and if you don’t care about them, then you won’t have the belief in their meaning. Example: you can do 100 finger curls today and 101 tomorrow, but that might not be of interest to you. Therefore, the first technique is to find something in life you care about and focus on fostering growth and protecting from harm in that area.
The second piece is more about the other seven drivers of meaning: experience, desire, belief, emotions, ethics, support, and choice. Your mind and body intrinsically want things, but your beliefs can suppress that desire. For example, you might want a mate but not believe that you can get the one you want, so you decide that you’re hopeless and give up trying to get one. So without desire and belief, you can’t care about anything. Same without having positive feelings about things you like (so that you know you like them), doing things in the right way and helping others to feel “greater meaning” in what you’re doing, and making the choice every day to find meaning in everything you do. That’s the “effort” mentioned earlier in the second technique: expose yourself to new experiences, build your desire and beliefs, do things ethically, get the support you need and help others, make the right choices, and monitor your emotions for positive feedback as to whether you’re on the right track.
While this is a simple approach, it’s not easy. You might have years of negative experiences causing you to feel bad and have negative beliefs. Therefore, it might take a lot of effort to turn it around. But it’s not impossible. It can be as simple as deciding to try something new every day until you find something you like or to simply meditate to practice reducing negative thoughts so that you can feel more positive about your life and things within it. Once you do that, you’ll find meaning in your life experiences. But if you’re ever lost, remember the simple adage to seek growth. Everything that people deem significant is related to growth enablement and harm aversion, from winning athletic competitions (growth) to inventing new medicines that can stop diseases from harming you (harm). When you find something that you care about that you can get better at, make better, maintain, or protect, you will find the meaning in life. Just remember that you’re the one who assigns that meaning, not me or anyone/anything else.