Get Busy and Live!

In his book The Mystery of Existence, the French philosopher Emile Zola illustrated the difference between living things and inanimate objects by identifying living things with what he called “vital objects.” These vital objects, according to Zola, are those qualities which enable living creatures to be alive, like heart, voice, and taste, and are not themselves part of the body. They are part of it in an indirect way, through the qualities that they can give to the living body. For instance, a heart pumps blood through the body, and a voice carries sound throughout the body. While some vital objects are permanently part of the human body without affecting its other qualities, like a voice, a heart, or a smell, others may change and become altered slightly for the better, becoming part of the body but not its soul.

There are many beliefs about life and meaning that help us make sense of life and place meaning into events and occurrences. According to the most common of these beliefs, our best purpose is simply to reproduce again in order to continue the process of creation, a process that is the basis of all life. From this perspective, life has no purpose other than to reproduce itself. Others believe that our purpose in life is to enjoy ourselves, while accepting the fact that we are a part of an intricate web of life that is perpetually generating and changing. Still others believe that life is meaningless and should be seen only as an accident of chance.

As an exercise in curiosity about life and its possibilities, you can ask yourself questions like, “If I didn’t get busy, would I ever know what my life’s purpose was?,” “If I never got busy, would I ever know what my worth is? “, or “If I never got busy, would I ever learn about the importance of beauty, friendship, love, sex, money, violence, or religion?” The answers to these questions may surprise you. And in time, they will confirm your own self-doubt. Asking questions like these is the first step toward discovering the precious gems of wisdom that you can discover deep down inside.