Far superior men and women than I have attempted to answer the mystifying, age-old question, what is the meaning of life? Heck, I’m still wrestling with the meaning of the lyrics of Bob Dylan’s “Desolation Row” and “It’s All Over Now Baby Blue” songs. A person’s belief and reaction is vastly an individual one based on their religious convictions, life experiences and upbringing. The event that started me contemplating this conundrum occurred about three weeks ago. A group of friends and acquaintances gathered at the foot of the Manhattan Beach Pier to conduct a celebration of life and spread the ashes of a dear friend who had recently passed away from cancer. We slowly made our way to the end of the pier, listened to a variety of moving, heartfelt tributes, and poignantly released his ashes to the sea. Over the course of the next few days, I sadly recalled an ever-growing list of friends who had passed away during my lifetime. As you might expect most had occurred over the past 10 years. My mind then wandered to the perplexing question we have all asked ourselves over the years—what is the meaning of life? Unable to come up with what I considered a suitable mind-easing answer, I Googled for clarity and understanding. Below are a few of the more satisfying and reassuring results. You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life. — Albert Camus The sole meaning of life is to serve humanity. — Leo Tolstoy I think essentially the meaning of life is probably the journey and not really any one thing or an outcome or a result. — Charisma Carpenter Just living is not enough…one must have sunshine, freedom and a little flower. — Hans Christian Andersen
When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left and could say, “I used everything you gave me.” — Erma Bombeck
The purpose of life is a life of purpose. — Attributed to both Ludwig Wittgenstein and Robert Byrne.
After about an hour or so of reading profound insightful references, I decided to turn to humorous quotes.
My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I’m happy. I can’t figure it out. What am I doing right? — Charles Schulz Do not take life too seriously. You will never get out of it alive. —Elbert Hubbard
Life is divided into the horrible and the miserable. — Woody Allen
It’s possible, you can never know that the universe exists only for me. If so, it’s sure going well for me, I must admit. — Bill Gates I hope life isn’t a big joke, because I don’t get it. —Jack Handly
You fall out of your mother’s womb, you crawl across open country under fire, and drop into your grave. — Quentin Crisp.
Of course there are hundreds of provocative, significant and meaningful quotes. However, the enormity of the question is mind-numbing. So, I’ve decided on the KISS (keep it simple stupid) approach for now and come up with a temporary, simplistic, easy to grasp quote of my own: “Enjoy Life!”
