Journeys in the Search for the Meaning of Life. A story of those who have found it

The boy's father asked, "You have, no doubt, found your special purpose in life?" "No, but in my opinion I know the overall reason for people's lives. Moreover, each of us has a special purpose and it is very important that each of us finds it."

At the words 'special purpose', the man and the young woman, perked up. The young woman, it turned out, was also a Russian speaker. I have often noticed that if a woman has that kind of a beauty, she is Slavic.

The man and the boy nearly shouted out in one voice:

"So what is the meaning of life? What is our special purpose?"

"Tell us, tell us," the boy implored, nearly crying.

The man sitting beside me also asked, "Pardon me for interfering, but I'm interested, too. Tell us; I'm sure it will be interesting to everyone. How did you arrive at your conviction, and how do you know that everyone can find his own special purpose?"

"For that, I need to tell you about my whole life, that will take quite some time."

At this, he was earnestly encouraged to continue; after all, there was plenty of time, and everyone would be glad.

Just as the plane finally taxied onto the runway and began accelerating for take off, "the wise one" consented to tell his story, which pleased the passengers greatly. As the plane sped down the runway, he sat back, closed his eyes, and appeared to be concentrating fully. When the plane finally took off, he opened his eyes, attentively looked out the window, and began his story. It all proceeded so smoothly, you could tell that he was completely engrossed in his thoughts.

A spectacular sunset was streaming through the windows. The clouds were adorned with streaks of the setting sun. It was the last day of winter. And for those of us who listened to the story, life now became divided into two parts – before and after this encounter.

"The wise one" spoke quite calmly and thoughtfully, pausing at times for almost a full minute. Including breaks for meals, the story took some five hours.

The stewardesses didn't understand Russian and simply looked on with interest at the company gathered together. No one ordered alcoholic drinks the whole flight; it was clear that they wanted to understand what he was telling them.

Later, after this flight, and with his consent, I met with "the wise man" and recorded this story. In fact, the basis of this story is really a set of recordings by Arthur (the actual name of "the wise man"), which he scrupulously laid down. Later, he gave me copies, asking only that I change the names of the characters in the story.

* * *

Let me briefly tell you about the fellow passengers with whom I later became friends. We each shared our life's stories, after which it was plain, once again, that life is not just a random event and God doesn't bring people together by sheer accident.

The young woman, whom we'll call Natasha, had flown to Canada from Europe to perform as a model in a show. Several shootings had been planned.

She was a successful economist, though this was not evident by looking at her. However, lately she had begun to feel that her life was not fulfilling. She was almost 30 and had achieved more than she had earlier imagined she could: she had graduated with honors from a prestigious institute and gotten a good job. There, they valued her, above all for a financial plan she'd devised which had brought the company success. Yet, out of personal curiosity, she had decided to give the modeling business a try. (She had always understood this to be a dream profession that most girls were willing to make every sacrifice to get into.) A girlfriend from way back in school, now a manager of a large agency, had invited her to give it a try.

Natasha now had an enviable portfolio which attracted the right people. She'd had a successful whirlwind tour of Europe and now this show in Canada. It would seem that she had achieved a dream – money and fame – but with it had come a certain dissatisfaction in life. She sat on the plane and though to herself.

"What's my life for? Why did I go on this trip? Here I am, 30 already, but – what now? Her thoughts were disturbing her. What's my purpose in life? Why was I born? Is everything really without meaning – 'make money and get famous', however you can, as my girlfriends would put it?" The way she saw it, her friends and colleagues paid more attention to playing at life than to finding happiness in it.

* * *

The man sitting to my right, Sergey, also had an interesting story to tell.

He was wondering how the second half of his life was rushing by so much faster than the first half, and the older he got, the more he noticed this. Hardly would one year begin than it would seem the end was already there.

He could only remember a couple bright spots in the current year. It was all like a trip on a super-fast express train, zooming along faster and faster, whereas his childhood had been, as if, on a quiet and slowly moving train. "Why is that? Where is the train rushing off to?" he asked himself, trying to find a logical answer to it all. Yet, the more he tried to sort it out, he only got himself more frustrated. So he tried to find answers from another source, one which had never attracted him before – a spiritual book. He prayed and sincerely asked God for help in understanding this matter. Then he decided just to observe the world around him and wait for a reply.

A few days later, here he was on this flight. He'd found a Russian newspaper which, by chance, had been left in the flap in front of his seat despite the work of the cleaning crew. It was some obscure regional paper from Russia and it was curious how it had gotten on a flight to London.

Sergey couldn't have cared less about that region's news. He didn't even want to read a newspaper. He was intent on finishing a book which he had to give back to a friend upon his return. Yet, the paper attracted his attention. He opened it in the middle, and there he saw a large article comparing child and adult psychology. The article hooked him with its first few lines. It lay out a number of interesting facts.

In general, children laugh naturally, openly, about 400 times a day, whereas for adults it's only 10–20 times at most, even if you count grins. Kids can jump into a creative mode – drawing, making clay models, and so on – at the drop of a hat, and enjoy it You can hardly expect to find an adult who would do this without expecting something in return – money, success, fame, etc.

Children live, as a rule, consciously, naturally, uninhibited by their emotions. Except for food, attention, and care, a child's complete development needs close emotional contact with both parents.

Adults live mechanically, always dreaming of the future and regretting the past, generally never living in the present moment. They slip on various masks, and would hardly be able to answer the question of who they really are. Children are always asking questions and always open to learning new things. The majority of adults have formed their view or vision of the world by age 40. (A survey showed that this occurred at various ages – some while they were still in grade school, some at midlife, and others only at age 80 or so.) Afterward, it is quite difficult to pull yourself off this track, and to some degree, you never do completely. Any event is formulated in terms of their own experience – a mental filter, if you will – through which they see the world and rarely truly ask themselves honest questions about their perceptions and emotions.

The article spoke of the importance of raising a child and how current teaching methods are inimical to a child. They are pushed to be result-oriented, made to absorb people's subjective understanding of things (both good and bad), burdened with accepting mediocrity, and are not given practical knowledge. Current pedagogic methods are authoritarian at their core yet completely lack morals and mores. There is no core spiritual base; children are taught a sort of consumer, 'mefirst' approach to life, which is catastrophic for their personality and for society in general. The main goal of modern education is to force-feed a child facts and knowledge, 95 % of which he will never use and, as a result, will quickly forget. The main focus is for the child to pass those all-important tests in math, physics, and so on.

A number of famous pedagogues are cited in the article – Makarenko, Suhomlinsky, Amonashvili, Neustryv, and others, not really known to Sergey, but about whom he intended to find out.

The main idea, without a doubt, was unconditional love. Those who got enough of it in their childhood grew up healthy, holistically, and in time becoming good parents, more capable of realizing their potential.

"And really, at what age would a person not need this unconditional love?" Sergey chuckled, while reading the article.

The article went on to mention how children often pose deep, philosophical questions. If one answers them in an adult fashion, they make rapid progress. It's worth listening to them; one begins to understand the saying, "Truth comes out of the baby's mouth." Children often ask questions about the meaning of life. It's quite important to answer them in all seriousness, or, if you aren't sure, promise to answer later, for an answer lacking in good formulation may become the only formula they have for their whole life, sometimes with tragic consequences.

How amazing! It was at that very moment of reading the article that he had heard the child asking his father the questions – Why? Why? Why? The father was answering with great difficulty and trepidation. And now the entire group was involved in the question of the meaning of life.

Here Arthur had begun his story; his recollections completely changed Sergey's life. It was like a miracle. He had only just finished an article on this subject and had so very recently asked for God's help in resolving this matter for him.

So, here is the story.

Chapter 1

Youthful Searching and Discoveries

Before Arthur had even learned to read, he posed the very same question as had little Peter, the boy on the airplane. He asked the question again and again. His parents answered him – "When you grow up, you'll understand." As a teenager, he continued to ask the question to intelligent people, considered to be experienced and knowledgeable, yet none of them could tell him why we live.

Oh, sure, he got a bucket load of standard answers: "You'll find out when you get older," "Don't ask stupid questions," "No one knows the answer to that," "To strengthen communism," "To have children," "To live a life of virtue," "To be an example to the generation growing up under you," "To have your name written into history," and so on.

No one could give a concrete, unambiguous answer. He was all the more disappointed that religious leaders were unable to answer it, but also simply gave some general, banal responses. Arthur did not resign himself to this. He intuitively understood that our lives couldn't be meaningless. Even scientific disciplines demanding the most precise measurements recognize that everything has a cause. Assuming, for the sake of argument, that we are merely biomechanisms or chemical substances; nevertheless, we have a reason for which we are born or purpose to fulfill in this world.

* * *

One day, on a trip with friends to the mountains, he went off on his own and climbed to the top of the highest one there. From this vantage point a stunning, enchanting vista was laid out before him. A spectacular panorama for many miles was around him and far off from his camp below he saw a small town. The people were but tiny dots, the buses like miniature match boxes. Their rushing about from way up high seemed an unnecessary and humorous farce, especially considering that it was all being played out in the backdrop of mountains that had seen changing civilizations for many thousands of years.

Questions which had been festering for so long surfaced again quite suddenly: why is there all this hustle and bustle in life? Who created all this beauty? What's the meaning of all it? What's the reason for my life, and is there, in fact, even a reason for it?

The next thing he simply had not expected at all. He dropped to his knees and imploringly beckoned to… well, he didn't really know how to formulate 'to whom'… to some Higher Reasoning Being, to the Creator, who had made all this – all this vastness and beauty. The surroundings and loneliness had naturally induced his communication with Him.

"If you exist, help me understand – why do we live, what is the meaning of all it? I don't want to live in the everyday humdrum rat race. I am prepared to devote my life to the attainment of the purpose for which I am meant, to learn the meaning of life, if there is one. Help me; I have no one else to turn to…"

Having said that, he felt a great satisfaction and joy welling within himself. An unknown bird trilled out a sweet song that underscored his feelings.

As he began to climb back down, the sun dipped behind the hills and, although it was still early yet, it suddenly became dark. This darkness made the descent more difficult than the ascent had been. He almost fell off a cliff after stepping on a stone that slipped aside, but he saved himself by grabbing onto a prickly bush. It took him half an hour, slowly pulling himself inch by inch to steady ground from the looming sheer drop below him, before he could reach safe ground. After that, he was able to reach a plateau, from which a fairly level path led to their camp.

Once he had reached safe ground, his whole body began to shake. He realized that, until then, a sense of 'here and now' had taken over. There had been only the mountains and him – no past, no future. He remembered every moment and every movement. Even after he was finally back down, he was still experiencing what had just taken place. He suddenly remembered that he had passed the graves of several mountain climbers, and this only served to underscore his philosophical state of mind after a near brush with death.

In this state, he joined his friends, who were having a lively discussion about the latest news at school.