(2006-08-10) Eby Making Meaning

Phillip J Eby says it is not the purpose of life to provide us with meaning. Rather, it is our purpose to supply the meaning to life, by our actions. And what we choose is our meaning... If we care for nothing, we will care about nothing, and this applies as much to caring for ourselves as anything else... When we do something in the present that we don't want to do or don't like to do, in order to obtain a future result (like exercising now to be healthy later), we are saying that we are worth something. This makes us feel better about ourselves now, whether we eventually achieve the desired result later or not. That's why goals are valuable: they call on us to care for, and thus make us care about, not only the subject of the goal, but ourselves. (Meaningful)