It’s why you’re here. The work, that is. We probably should call it The Work; it’s that important. And it is just as important that you do the work, once you are clear on what that means.

What’s The Work?

I’m not going to get all preachy about why you are here, because you are the only person who can define your meaning, your purpose. You may choose to listen to someone else’s rationale for your existence, but that has never worked well for me. You can define your own purpose and then change it as necessary. It’s your life, after all.

Don’t let the conversational tone fool you; we are talking about deep existential philosophy/psychology/spirituality here.

As far as I can tell, from my own introspection and training and decades of working with clients and students, we each have a great deal of latitude when it comes to a determination of why we exist and what we should do with it. And that meaning determines the nature of the work.

Who Are You?

If you are a carpenter, your work is to build things. If you are a composer, the work revolves around writing music. The idea is pretty straightforward when you apply it to an occupation.

When you consider you in the context of a whole person, the concept is not nearly as obvious.

You may have a job or a career, but you are also a child or a parent, maybe both. You are likely a friend and an acquaintance, perhaps a student, employee or employer (or all three, if you are self-employed). You may be a lover, if you are fortunate; a spouse or partner or friend-with-benefits, possibly a one-night-stander or some other species of serial monogamist.

You could be a pet owner, an amateur cook, a bedroom musician, a gamer or quilter or survivalist. The list goes on.

And then there is the near-infinite roster of personality traits and physical characteristics that no one else has in exactly the same combination: the things that make you uniquely you. And all of that is in constant flux as a function of time, genetics and circumstance.

Put all this together and the question of The Work - your life purpose - can be altogether overlooked.

Why Work?

Modern life is a never-ending parade of distraction. We are connected to a high-speed/WiFi/Bluetooth/fiberoptic/5G/terabyte/petaflop/8K firehose of tweets, reels, stories, videos (short- and long-form, of course), subreddits, and other posts that can provide more “content” than you could ever consume.

Factoid: As of this writing, there are 12 hours of video uploaded to YouTube every second, and that volume is increasing exponentially.

Purpose? Meaning? Hell, we don’t even have to think; that’s what we have Google for. Soon, we won’t even have to think about what we think about; that’s why we have AI.

But so what? What if we just stay distracted and behave as though we are NPCs* in an inescapable simulation?

Well first, if you decided to spend your life online you have, in fact, defined your purpose, pathetic and wasteful though it may be.

Second, you enjoy very real benefits when you define your purpose and do the concomitant work. A sense of purpose significantly contributes to longevity, community, productivity and sanity. When you choose to define a meaning for your existence and do the work mandated by that meaning, you choose happiness and resilience.**

And you avoid an inescapable river of regret at the end of your life.

Is it easy to discover the life-purpose work you should do? Not always.*** But this is your life we are talking about, and it’s worth the time and effort to figure it out:

It is the most important work you can do.

Why Not?

So if doing your life’s work so important, why do we ignore it or procrastinate, or refuse it altogether?

It may be that, in the onslaught of other information you face, you really never thought about it. When our ancestors had only the moon and stars to occupy their thoughts at night - not that long ago - there was plenty of time for reflection. You may be too distracted by the details of your life to actually think about your life.

That’s why I wrote this article; to introduce you to the concept that there is a meaning for your existence, whether or not you have yet found it.

But if you have thought about your life’s meaning but are not yet engaged in the work of being that, there is a list of other possible culprits.

We have already discussed the very likely possibility that you are distracted by trivial pursuits. Also possible are fear, anxiety, depression, and plain old ennui.

Beyond and behind all of those maladies is the specter of existential angst, a situation far too deep to explore here. Suffice to say that it is a profound sense of dread and apprehension - and in some cases, sheer panic - that accompanies thoughts about the “big questions” of life: mortality, freedom, responsibility, isolation and yes, meaninglessness. (See again***)

Do The Work

Be that as it may, the sooner you begin to wrestle with the work of your life’s meaning, your purpose, the sooner you will start to replace the moments of unexplained emptiness, longing and anxiety - maybe even fear - that we all experience, with understanding.

(Experiment for you: Try taking a long drive with no radio or other distractions. Why might you begin to feel uneasy or restless?)

I could (and have, actually) go on for hundreds of pages about this most consequential of topics. Instead, I will leave you with two related thoughts for your consideration:

Never stop learning. Never stop thinking. Define a purpose for your life and act on it.

Consciousness is the rarest and most ineffable gift you can receive. Don’t waste yours.

__________

*Non-player characters: the characters in video games that are not connected to input from a real person. (In the unlikely event that you were unfamiliar with this definition, leave me a comment.)

**Yes, there are peer-reviewed data to support these claims; I’m a scientist, after all. Let me know if you’re interested in citations. Better yet, ask ChatGPT or your AI of choice.

***I have written quite a bit about this; if you go to my website, you can search my blog articles for terms like “purpose” and “meaning.” I am finishing a book that deals with this subject at length, and of course, I am available to work with you to help you define your meaning.

Click HERE to get my FREE training, Five Steps to Elevate Your Mindset!


To learn more about how to use these concepts or to inquire about working with me, you can contact me on the Hardcore Happiness website, the comments section on my Substack or Medium accounts or the Hardcore Happiness blog page. If you have found value in this article, follow my Instagram account for daily insights, or my X account for occasional tweets. To support this community, you can Buy Me A Coffee or donate through my Patreon account.

- JWW