What is our purpose? It’s a question that has echoed through every age of humanity, shaping religions, philosophies, and personal quests for meaning, and one which our modern era—despite all our scientific breakthroughs and technological advances—has so utterly failed in answering. This has left a profound void in many people’s lives.
The search for purpose has never been more pressing, as countless people feel unfulfilled, sensing there must be more to life than the relentless pursuit of wealth and material success. But what if the answer has been right in front of us all along, as clear and simple as a ripe fruit hanging low from a tree?
When we look at the universe, we see an engine of creation: stars birthing elements, galaxies forming stars, planets forming around stars. Looking at life on our planet specifically, we see life itself mirroring this pattern—a microcosm of this same engine of creation taking place. Our Earth has been the stomping ground for countless lifeforms throughout the ages, allowing a complex process of evolution to take place as creatures of greater and greater complexity are created, resulting in the diversity we see today. We humans sit at the end of this timeless process of universal creation, here in the present moment.
Creation
So, looking at this situation logically, it seems obvious that our purpose, the purpose of human existence, is creation. After all, it is what the universe seems to have been doing for countless eons. We are here to create, just like everything else. You look at a star, and it is creating also: complex elements that will eventually be used for other creations. A galaxy creates stars.
The universe as an engine of creation is the logical conclusion, and the ultimate understanding that can be concluded from this, is that there is a creator of the universe. Science calls it the big bang and religions call it God, but it is the same thing: the great Mother.
Creation is our human purpose, specifically, co-creation. We are here to create: beauty, art, landscapes, technologies to assist us. This is the reason for human existence, and we have the whole Earth as our canvas.
We are the culmination of a timeless process of creation. We could ask, then, what would be the highest form of our creation, the greatest contribution we could make to this universal creative process? The answer is logical: another human being.
Humans are unique in the cosmos. We can observe 10 billion trillion stars, in every corner of the universe. The number of planets is at least that number, or more. Thus far, however, we know of only 1 planet in the universe where humans exist, and there are only 8 billion of us.
The highest form of creation for a human being is the co-creation of another human being. Not just as a by product of carnal desire either, but the conscious creation of another human.
This stands in stark contrast to the way most people live their lives. For many people, men especially, and now more than ever, their family unit is treated almost as a side project. Their main purpose in life is whatever their job is, or getting a better job, or even more general: the creation of wealth. Money, that is most peoples purpose in life.
Ask someone, even most highly spiritual people, what are their goals in life. What are you doing with your life? They want a bigger house, more furniture for the house, a new TV, vacation to Hawaii, new car. And once they have all that, then there is a list of more things. In essence, money is their purpose. This is why so many people are depressed and unhealthy. Their life purpose and mission does not align with the universal purpose assigned to us by the universe: creation. Their only saving grace on this quest for more money is their family unit, which very often comes second or even third on their list of priorities.
Many men would consider it a point of pride that they got the new promotion at work, or finally started that company they have been dreaming about, even while their divorced wife raises his children by herself. What’s worse, our society praises any man for these types of accomplishments alone, never considering how many wives he’s divorced or how many children he has practically abandoned as a father.
Misplaced values
Our culture has been walking ass-backwards into the future, for a long time now. On the list of values for most people in our society, after money comes technology. Family doesn’t even come second for many, not anymore. Put on a movie for the kids, give them their phone, I want to go watch the game on TV. Our culture prides itself on its technology, but lets ask ourselves, what does this technology do for us that aligns with our human purpose of creation?
Screens have so thoroughly destroyed our attention span and creativity that most people cannot even sit patiently in a room for 10 minutes without have some serious inner turmoil. Our society expects to be entertained. Why be creative ourselves if we can simply sit down and have the creative thoughts of someone else shown to us, creative thoughts that very often have an agenda of their own, I might add.
And what about all the factories that produce the various goods and services we all value greatly? What of the pollution they regurgitate into the sacred waters of our land and distant lands. What of the minerals they mine and extract from the Earth, often at the expense of human lives and destroyed land in the wake of the extraction? What of our Earth that is being destroyed in this process, every second of every day? Is this technology truly so advanced?
This aspect of our culture is so obvious and logical that its truly hard to comprehend. The analogy of boiling a lobster slowly comes to mind. Perhaps people didn’t sense what was happening slowly over time, but the evidence is here, just look around. And ask yourself, is it truly worth it? Is your phone so important to you, that the Earth should be destroyed to create it? Is your new thing from Amazon so special to you that some child in another country should be basically forced to make it, and some sacred land somewhere be destroyed to extract the minerals to produce it?
The best part in all this are the people who run to the defense of the status quo, saying things like, “that’s easy for you to say, typing that article on a computer, or recording that video on a phone, driving your car around.” Is the brainwashing so thorough in our culture that this is the response to a simple logical investigation? Are people so unwilling to take responsibility for their action or inaction, for their mistakes in their life, that they cannot even entertain their values have been misplaced?
We have a choice—question everything
I would respond to these questions with my own, “what choice do I have?” I was, like all of you, born into this society. I did not choose to, it simply happened. I did not inherit any ancestral land or territory, in fact I did not inherit anything. I am like most of you, born into a world without any domain to call my own or my families, and then upon a predetermined age, expected to venture out into the world and figure it out for myself. I was lucky enough to have a very good childhood, but beyond that I am subject to the same systems as all of you are, systems that are designed to oppress and extract.
No, the only choice most of us has is to play the game presented to us, use the systems that are already in place. Of course, if I had an ancestral domain, an area of land that I could call my own and my families, one where I could grow food, raise animals, use the wood and live with nature, then I would have a choice. But I don’t have that, not yet. We are building it though.
I have lived in the jungles of Costa Rica for 7 years with my wife and children, who were born here. We have chickens and grow as much of our own food as we can, and more every year. I drive my car to the nearest city four times a month, doing our shopping once a week at the local farmers market. We buy only food products that can be grown here in Costa Rica.
I could do without my phone or computer and live a very happy life here with my family in the jungle, but for what reason? To appease some self-appointed defender of the status quo who says I must do so to be allowed to criticize the illogical an purposeless society I was born in to? And then what would change in the world, for my children? When they ask me in 20 years, “dad, what did you do when you noticed what was happening in the world, where everything was going?” What am I to tell them? “Son, daughter, I ran away to live in the jungle and left everyone to their doom.”
Are we not affected, all of us, by what is happening everywhere else in the world? Every 10,000 acres of Amazon rainforest that are destroyed leaves an imprint on our species. Every gallon of pollution that enters a river, every worker who dies of cancer in a factory or mineral processing plant, every puff of smoke that leaves the exhaust pipe of a car, it all leaves an imprint. There is no escape.
I have designed my life in such a way that I can serve as an example to others to do something similar, and I have decided it is my purpose to share that with as many people as I can. It is the responsibility of parents to fix the world that we are bringing our children in to. Those who choose to accept this responsibility will benefit greatly from it, finding purpose and meaning for their lives and an intense love flowing through their veins. Those who choose to neglect this responsibility, who prefer to walk blindly into their demise, will suffer the consequences: a life without real meaning or purpose, and hollow and empty relationships with their children.
A bright future
I don’t yet have this domain for my family, but I will soon. And you can to! Imagine, just for a moment. What if you were born into a family which had its own domain, owned land that had been in the family for generations. As a child you remember visiting the apple tree your great grandfather planted, with its big delicious gifts of sweet, red joy. You have fond memories of that tire swing your grandfather built for your dad, which you then inherited.
You remember the joy of time spent with the baby goat who, like you, was born into a family domain. It was customary in your family to grow your own food, milk the goats, collect the eggs and catch fish in the pond. It was only 3 acres, but how vast that land felt to you. Every year your family celebrated real holidays, that had deep meaning and purpose in how they celebrated the passage of time and different phases of life. Changing seasons, maturity, finding love…
And when you came of age, 18 years old, you likely keep living your life as you had before. You might venture out into the world, but there was no pressure. And, when you did decide to go figure things out on your own, you knew there was always a place on the Earth where you could come back to should you need. A family domain, a safe place. You therefore felt no need to try and be somebody you weren’t, or to fit into a world where you didn’t feel like you belong. There was always home.
Take a moment and close your eyes and really imagine for a moment this life. This is what I am building for my family and my children. You can build it too.
Now, tell me, where do phones and television fit in here? Or plastic toys and knick-knacks from China? Where do you imagine the great need is for massive advances in modern technology here? Of course, there are some things that modern life provides which would be great to have in this paradise: electricity, refrigerators, power tools, steel. And this is exactly the slippery slope which people slid down into modernization and urbanization.
Sadly, this image of a family domain, a homeland, is disappearing almost altogether. Try and think of how many people you know that have this, or are even interested having this. People in todays society don’t understand the value, they prefer something which has predetermined value: money. Most people don’t have any use for a piece of land, aside from selling it to get money in its place. And what will they do with the money. Buy things, in an attempt to buy love. What do they get instead? Loneliness, and a life devoid of meaning. Kids that want to leave the nest as soon as possible, because they know and observe there is no real meaning in that nest. They must go find their own.
Todays society is built in such a way to all but prevent this possible future, one in which every human is empowered to live their own life, to build themselves a domain, to create their own very real paradise on Earth. And what do the heroes of our technocratic society proclaim? Just wait for the AI, the robots, the universal basic income, then all will be well. That we must continue to pursue the technocratic dream, that it is the only way.
Liberation
I wonder, is it possible, that ancient cultures, having arrived at the threshold of shifting to a world driven by technological innovation, decided to take a different path? We see what can only be explained as miracles of engineering: pyramids, vast underground structures and stones of monolithic proportions that even our best scientists struggle to imagine how they were created by humans. Is it possible these civilizations decided, at this threshold, to take a different path? Maybe they saw what was coming, the hollow dream that technology promised.
I’m not wholly against technology either, by the way. Perhaps now I should point out I have a degree in mechanical engineering and personally love many of the technological innovations we have created. Table saws, planers, modern steel, and more. It’s more that I see how humans are, and some of the inevitable ways we seem to do things.
What would the world look like if we only made the refrigerators and electricity, not the disposable plastic toys. What if we only made the best, most durable things instead of stuff made to break within a year or 2 and become trash? What would social media be like, without all the ads, data tracking, and features designed to addict you to its use? What would television be like if it was only reserved for special occasions, and only for adults who’s brains are fully developed?
More to the point, how would we ever prevent select individuals, corporations and governments from using these goods or services for their own ends and to accumulate vast empires and wealth? Is it government oversight? Deregulation? Increased regulation? This question seems so complex at face value that many would struggle to answer it. However, it is actually extremely simple to answer, it just takes an empowered individual to answer it.
The answer is us. It us up to every single one of us. It is the decisions we make, each one of us, every single day. Whenever you spend your money, you cast a vote into the universe, a vote for what you want more of in your life. When you choose to go out to eat at the restaurant that imports most of their ingredients from Italy, you tell God, “please give us more cargo ships and ocean pollution.” Every time you drive your car to the store just to pick up a pound of flour, you tell God, “I want more gasoline refineries, pollution in the rivers, and car manufacturing plants.”
Money is energy, that is undeniable. You traded hours in your day for the money in your bank account. If you then give that money to people who destroy the planet, you yourself destroy the planet. And you make that dream of a family domain, a piece of land that descends through the generations and provides a safe haven for your family forever, that dream of great-grandfathers apple tree and grandfathers tire swing and family celebrations, that dream becomes a more and more distant memory.
Or, you can build it now, and liberate yourself from this cycle of stupidity, of a culture of lemmings walking single file to the edge of a great cliff. If you do it, maybe someone else will too. Maybe we can even do it together.
