The Meaning of Life with Dr. Bob

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Living from a full heart, here is another buried treasure of knowing the meaning of life and living “to be happy.” When you find your Self full inside, you live as does a altruist. You give because you have so much and you want to share that with those who don’t have so much. (In my case, I feel I have so much inside that I want to share with those who may not have as much. Those who have not yet found how “to be happy.” The meaning of life.)

A philanthropist is enabled to give because at the heart of the giving is an excess, an overflow. Please notice here, and please be careful here, that you do not necessarily make philanthropy equal to great riches. A person of any means may recognize within her or his life an excess. That over-abundance may be of time. Perhaps a person has an excess of time and can give those hours away in voluntary service. Perhaps a person recognizes that he has $10 more than he needs and can give that away during the holiday season to the Salvation Army. Joy in gardening within a person may overflow from one’s own garden. So that the little garden path in front of the town hall is kept tidy and bright with blooming flowers in all of the growing season.  Someone may genuinely love working with animals and so volunteers at the local humane society. Another may genuinely love children and so volunteers at a day care center. Please do not confuse philanthropy only with those who have a great deal of money.

First there is an overflow. Then there are actions in the corporal world because of that overflow. But a strange thing then happens. Giving from an abundant heart helps one feel good, “to be happy.” Many people mistakenly think the actions make them feel good. Actually it is giving from the abundant heart that causes that good feeling.

I have seen 40 years of life-coaching people. When I gave the advice to give out the abundance of their hearts, I observed one of two reactions: 1.) They just didn’t see how that would help them and did nothing of the kind. Or, 2.) They followed the advice, and did something for someone else, and reported the joy they felt. These persons often accounted, “I feel I get more out of this than I give.” Probably true.

So, when you want to know the meaning of life and feel the joy, give from the abundance of your heart.

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The meaning of life proceeds from the abundance of the self. It is out of the abundance of the self that making a lasting contribution to humankind comes. Without a rich and full “being,” “doing” has no backing. It has no container out of which may pour the energy and imagination of effort.

Here are two examples.

Mother Teresa. A woman, small in stature, who went to India to serve. There she served the poorest of the poor as they were dying. With great respect I say that this was a great work. It was a lasting contribution to humankind.

I did not know Mother Teresa personally. All I know of her and her work is what I have read or heard. I just cannot imagine that anyone could keep on the work she did over a period of decades without having some inner resource. “To do” is a working out what’s inside, “to be.” Her “to be” was a connection to what some will name God. Her volition to go on in the face of so much sadness and death could only have come from what was on the interior. Her work could not possibly be sustained if her inner abundance were not strong enough.

I know this because I experienced it. (Second example.) No, I do not compare myself to Mother Teresa. But I do know within myself some of what she experienced. In my professional career as a life coach I had occasion to visit nursing homes on a regular basis. In those nursing homes I would see and converse with persons of great age and sometimes great infirmity. And I tell you that without a strong inner center attached to The Source of All That Is, there was no way I could continue to go to those nursing homes.

Now, please, I’m not talking about the persons themselves that I visited. I am talking about the conditions of their minds and bodies. Too much to internalize. I must give an everlasting respect to health care persons who spend after day working in those nursing homes. Without some kind of inner strength, whatever name you give it, they could not do their work.

Without this sort of inner self-abundance, inner strength, you would miss the meaning of life.

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The meaning of life has nothing necessarily to do with having amounted to something or made some great contribution.

But here we are in the realm of “Do.” Many people think that the meaning of life is to have amounted to something. Or made a donation, a lasting contribution to humanity. These are certainly important accomplishments. I repeat myself –  there’s nothing wrong with “doing.” But doing reflects upon the doer. Doing reflects back into the doer. In other words, whatever you’re doing, reflects back into you. People often say when they are doing good works, it makes them feel so good. That’s true and that’s real. But it’s also true and real than doing without a source of being eventually becomes sycophantic and unsupportable.

Here is a red barn. It looks good from the outside. Looks like it is serving its purpose. However, the owners of the barn no longer use it for anything. It still stands as a barn but its insides are neglected. A rafter has becomes ineffective. A cross-member becomes dry-rotted. One day, “out of the blue,” the building collapses. The barn is no longer a barn; just a heap of rubble. The barn was overlooked for so long that it accordioned from the inside out. The reason it could “do,” remaining a building where animals and crops might be sheltered, collapsed due to neglect of its crucial construction.

It is our essential construction that gives us the meaning of life. Great if we can make a contribution or amount to something in this life. But if our insides are weak, we may look good to the outside world, but we know we are falling apart inside. “Good works (alone) avail a man nothing.” The “to be” part needs to be in place first and foremost in a person’s life.

It is out of being that doing stirs.

It is out of the abundance of the self that making something of oneself comes. It is out of the abundance of the self that making a difference in the world comes. It is out of the abundance of the self that making a lasting contribution to humankind comes. Without a rich and full “being,” doing has no backing. It has no container out of which may pour the energy, imagination and effort of doing.  This is the meaning of life, “to be happy.”

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