A Life Well Lived
How do we live a happy and fulfilling life? Isn’t it odd that people in this day and age continue to ponder answers to this hackneyed question when, as we do with virtually everything else in our lives, we can merely Google it and get more than adequate answers at a moment’s notice? Our understanding of human psychology has advanced so significantly in the last several centuries that the supposed secret of a life well lived is far from a mystery to us at this point; plenty of individuals had already fleshed out profound answers to these sorts of questions even millennia ago, albeit not backed by any form of scientifically proven claims (not that they are necessary to adequately answer this question).
We already understand the specific contributors towards happiness and fulfillment—healthy relationships, whether in romance, friendship, or family, adequate food, water, and shelter, freedom from oppression, challenging, engaging, and fulfilling work, mental and physical wellness, and a working balance between hardship and leisure. Obviously, not everyone’s definitions of these aspects of happiness or fulfillment will look the same, and while there is indeed a myriad of different philosophies that approach it differently, they will always generally follow similar themes.
We also equally understand the inimical actions that are likely to detract from a positive, meaningful experience of life—our mindless participation in these constant games of manipulation and deception, of judgment and ridicule, of all that constitutes our emotional negligence and ignorance, ultimately deteriorating our social relationships; our unquestioning commitment to mundane, brainless, and soul-sucking work that we can neither be proud of nor derive satisfaction from; our inordinate use of alcohol, recreational drugs, social media, television, video games, and other forms of entertainment that ruthlessly rot our brain; our edification of hedonism, materialism, and the status hierarchy that consigns so many of us to an inane rat race, depriving us of any real sense of purpose; the inevitable cascading series of negative consequences of these factors that ultimately degrade our culture, our awareness of and compassion for each other’s suffering, and exacerbate existing problems within human welfare.
And yet we act as if we don’t know. We act as if we don’t understand the reasons as to why we’re so unhappy and unfulfilled, why we all seem to be mired in a rut of purposelessness, why we feel as if the world we live in is cruel and unjust. We act as if the secret to a life well lived remains an unsolved mystery, when in actuality all the hard questions have already been asked—for thousands upon thousands of years, at that—and we correspondingly have a plethora of answers. We have several millennia worth of knowledge at our disposal—an innumerable quantity of seminal works from thinkers far more erudite in the human condition and with far more wisdom than virtually any of us could ever hope to have. Confucius, Buddha, the authors of the Bible, Laozi, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Hume, Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, Marx, Freud, Jung, Russell, Heidegger, Wittgenstein, Camus, Chomsky, Foucault—you name it; these are just the most venerated ones among thousands. Despite the scope of their contributions towards humanity, most of us can’t help but perceive them merely as distant relics of the past. For the vast majority of people in this modern age, their work remains fatefully consigned to the dustbins of history, a realm of study which itself has become desolate and esoteric.
The fountain of truth is brimming with knowledge, overflowing with wisdom, and far more accessible to the common person today than at any point in our entire history. And yet, most of us choose not to drink from it. The most important conclusion we can make by studying the work of the past is realizing that we haven’t changed all that much, if at all, and that our present pondrance of the question of what constitutes a life well lived inexorably aligns with that of our ancestors. We cannot come to the haughty and naive conclusion that all these great thinkers of the past are irrelevant in today’s circumstances and imperiously claim we know better than every single one of them, lest we repeat the mistakes of the past and compel ourselves to relearn all the lessons that our predecessors sacrificed everything for, fighting tooth and nail just to learn what it means to be happy and what it means to be fulfilled. When all has been asked and all has been answered, all there is left to do is humble ourselves, be conscious of our impertinence and arrogance, and commit ourselves to learning not only the specificities of our struggle within contemporary life, but, more importantly, the overarching themes and motifs that inextricably link the past and the present iterations of the human condition.
Once we’ve opened up our eyes and once we understand what it truly means to live a life well lived, it’s impossible not to come to the daunting realization that even though the exponential advances in science and philosophy have given us ever-more fleshed out answers for centuries at this point, our anachronistic industrial societies obstinately remain perpetually hypnotized by the gaudy splendor and garish glory of consumerism and its promises of wealth, power, and fame. It becomes increasingly difficult to ignore just how abysmally designed our societies are at aiding us in this quest for happiness and fulfillment. This is a society in which we turn a blind eye to the frankly insulting disparity of wealth and privilege across social classes; in which we tolerate a backwards, cruel educational system that does little to promote genuine, inspired learning but instead treats our children as commodities in need of quality control and processing, wherein the defective—everyone who isn’t able to isn’t willing to conform to the preset standard—are casted out and ostracized; in which we settle for corrupt and spineless politicians and captains of industry whose vested interests are to profit off our impulsive desires, to milk us for every ounce of productivity they can get away with, to reinforce the cultural status quo and thus the legitimacy of their profligate actions; in which we become inured to injustice, intolerance, violence, and the deterioration of our physical and mental health caused by none other than our collective irresponsibility and complacency.
When this is all that we’ve known for our entire lives, it’s no surprise that it's so difficult for us to disillusion ourselves and break free from the chains of conventional thought that seek to mollify us by flattering us with these promises of prosperity if we just follow the rules and don’t ask questions. But we will not be mollified; we can choose a better future for ourselves and the generations to come by simply learning to ask the right question. With this fountain of knowledge abounding and easily accessible to each and every one of us, we no longer need to burden ourselves with these confounding metaphysical and psychological questions when our predecessors have already asked and answered that question ad nauseam. Rather, the difference we can make today lies in our willingness and bravery to bring to trial all that comprises our contemporary life—all these intricate systems in place, all these deep-seated norms and conventional definitions of happiness and fulfillment, all these oppressive stories and narratives that we tell ourselves constantly—and instead of blithely asking ourselves what constitutes a life well lived, we ask ourselves how all this helps us live life well, if at all.
