Dear Stupid Question,
You sound so important when you’re asked.
“What’s the meaning of life?”
People lower their voices.
They lean in.
They expect thunder, commandments, or at least a TED Talk.
But maybe you’re the philosophical equivalent of asking what time it is on the sun.
There’s no clock up there.
No timezone.
No wristwatch strapped to a flaming star.
The question assumes something that isn’t true.
That “meaning” exists out there, waiting to be discovered.
That life is a riddle with a correct answer.
That if we just think hard enough, we’ll unlock it.
But life doesn’t work like that.
Meaning isn’t found.
It’s made.
Not determined.
Not assigned.
Created.
Given.
Lived into.
And the more we chase a universal definition, the more we miss the point.
Because while we’re busy asking what life means,
life is already happening.
Breathing.
Laughing.
Hurting.
Healing.
Connecting.
Maybe the meaning of life isn’t something you step back and analyze.
Maybe it’s something you step into.
A conversation.
A relationship.
A moment where you really show up.
Not later.
Not someday.
Now.
We don’t give meaning to life by solving it.
We give meaning to life by relating to it.
By loving someone.
By being loved.
By noticing we’re not alone on this strange, spinning rock.
So maybe the real answer to the stupid question is beautifully simple:
The meaning of life is life.
And whatever meaning shows up…
shows up between us.
Which makes me want to ask the reader something far more useful:
Instead of asking what life means…
who are you with that’s giving life meaning?
With you always – in spirit,
~ The Radical Left