What is the Meaning of Life?

Does anyone really know the answer to the question, “What is the meaning of life?”  I imagine you want to know what I believe.

Perhaps, the meaning and the purpose of life is to become utterly aware of the source of your life, of all lives. Because of that awareness, you revere and respect all of creation. You know the reality of the unity, the interconnectedness, and the benevolence that exists .

For a moment, turn your attention to that which is looking through your eyes. What is there? What is that?

Now, listen to the sounds in the room you are in. Who is it who is listening?  What is this “you” that is attending to and aware of the sounds?  

Consider the question again, who is it who is reading, and listening?

From what/where does your attention arise?

Once you begin to become aware of your attention, you inevitably will become more intimate with its source. Your attention arises from your awareness— a source field of love and light.  It is the same source field of love that moves the mountains, that moves you, and that it is inherent in everything.

Some people would call this source God, others, the creative field of intelligence, some, the field of love, or your true nature.  It doesn’t matter what you call it. What matters is that you have the direct experience of it and come to realize this love is inside you and all around you.

What happens to that which you truly give your natural attention to, whether it’s your body, your plants, your education, your environment, your pets, your partner, or your kids?

I imagine your attention nourishes the relationship, the very object you focus it on.

Just as when someone pays you kind attention. Doesn’t it feel like love?

You can think of your attention as a currency. And a valuable one. It is the currency of love. You can use it like a flashlight, shining its love beam onto what you wanted to illuminate. Knowing this, you just might start to become more in charge of to what and to whom you “pay” your attention. You have the power to focus your attention where and how you want. And, we know from physics there is an observer effect. Your gentle, natural attention has an effect on the world around you.

You can’t think your way to this realization. In fact, the more you think about what I am writing about, the less you will realize it.

The way I, and many people before me, have been able to awaken to this reality is through meditation. Meditation, when practiced correctly, without preconceived ideas and expectations, allows you to become intimate with your interior.

Meditation is a practice that settles the fluctuations of the mind and the thought activity is transcended. Then, you directly experience the source of your awareness. And this realization changes everything.

I hope you too realize the source of your life—the field of love—the creative intelligence that infuses all that is. Look for it.

You will always find what you are looking for, and you will come to realize that what you are seeking is, in fact, seeking you.

My prayer for everyone is this: may you awaken to the love that lives through you as you. May you realize your true nature. Once you experience the source of your life, you’ll know the meaning and purpose of your life.

Sarah McLean
Sarah McLean is an acclaimed teacher and thought leader who is determined to create more peace on this planet by helping people wake up to the wonder and beauty of their lives and the world around them through the practices of meditation and mindfulness. She inspires audiences everywhere blending the spirit of Zen wisdom with Vedic knowledge and self-inquiry. She helps demystify meditation and makes it accessible to anyone. It was over 30 years ago when she began her daily meditation practice, and moved in to a Transcendental Meditation community. There, she received advanced training in meditation and studied Ayurveda. Since 1993, when she became the education director for Deepak Chopra’s Center for Mind Body Health, she's been teaching contemplative practices and mind/body health. In 1997, she went to India to live in a traditional ashram in India, When she returned to the States, spent two years as a resident trainee in a Zen Buddhist monastery. She fell in love with Self-inquiry and served as the director of Byron Katie's School for the Work. In 2012, she founded the McLean Meditation Institute, home of the Meditation Teacher Academy which certifies meditation and mindfulness teachers through its 300-hour teacher training program. Sarah is also the co-director of the Feast for the Soul, a nonprofit, now in its 17th year. Her bestseller, Soul-Centered: Transform Your Life in 8 Weeks with Meditation, and her most recent book, The Power of Attention: Awakening to Love have received rave reviews. She now lives in Santa Barbara, California where she trains meditation teachers and offers online classes and lives a life she loves.
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