What Happened to Meaning?

It’s that deep sense that you’ve just witnessed or read something that touched your life. It’s that feeling you get when you are with friends (or family), and you’re all laughing uncontrollably at the stupidest of things.

You might start to feel emotion welling up inside of you, feel motivated to do something you never thought possible, or simply be touched enough to have coffee with a friend and share the experience.

You might realize something new, like the fact that we ARE very different, yet connected to each other by forces we don’t yet understand (and might never).

It’s that feeling deep down, that THIS is why you’re alive.

You’ve watched a movie, and at the end you get that feeling like you’re connected to something way beyond yourself.

You’ve listened to music and feel the message of the song coursing through your soul. (Although in today’s over-homogenized music culture, that happens less and less).

It’s when you feel like you’re connected to humanity (you know what I mean, and if you don’t, well…).

We’ve lost the deep, true, and connected meaning in our lives.

I’m talking big picture, “everything is connected” meaning. It’s the meaning that is hard to describe, but you know when it’s missing.

We’re missing that.

We’re too busy checking text messages, head down, buried in our gadgets to feel that sense of meaning.

And no, you cannot get the feeling of meaning I’m talking about from text messages.

Movies are crap nowadays. They are endless rehashes of older movies, stupid sequels, or just plain garbage.

T.V. programs (the few I try to watch) are becoming less and less creative … lacking meaning by series or per episode (possible exception might be some innovative Netflix programs that you WON’T find on @Comcast).

Endlessly and hopelessly recycling the “end the episode with some sort of ‘hook’” model, they are following big movie industry examples to the letter.

Crap on Twitter, crap on blogs, crap … crap … crap… from public shaming of people because they don’t say something right or act perfectly to some imagined set of rules (#RegressiveLeft), to large corporations buying yet another round of Government legislation.

It’s like an endless media and cultural content “whore house” of recycled, rehashed, meaningless bytes, images, and pixels (I call this the “Age of Overmedia“).

There is no meaning in the mainstream media anymore.

Numerous blogs pointing to some sort of collapse of civilization, endless stories of how the climate is going to hell (because of us to some degree, and yes, it’s true), and how species are becoming extinct.

These aren’t meaning, perhaps valid warnings, but there is no meaning here.

But don’t get me wrong, there are still stories of human gratitude, charity, and connected-ness with our only planet … but these stories are getting fewer and far-er in between.

The distance between the latest flavor of Doritos and the true story of someone helping a stranger out (or just being content with life) is much greater than ever before.

And the distance between that same flavor of Doritos to the next story of disease, war, or vaccine-shaming on the news media is getting shorter.

What happened to real meaning?

We need more meaningful connection with each other, more willingness to help a neighbor out, and less war-mongering politicians and lobbying.

We need media who will spread the more meaningful stories, and less of the Government-stenography.

We need to remember events like 9/11 and WWII, but stop letting them control any part of our society.

We need to slow down, stop, and think critically about what we communicate.

Quit berating each other for having faults that are human, because remember, you are human too.

And, I’m 100% sure you have faults or mistakes you wouldn’t want brought out into the public domain for the same “public jury” to judge.

About that “public jury,” we should temper that. At least, unless the evil is corrupt enough to justify it (again, thinking critically before doing so).

Free speech is important (read: critical), and the right to expression of that free speech is critical … but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t think critically about what you’re saying before you say it.

I want meaning back. Genuine, heart-felt, shake me to the core meaning.

Let’s all work together, and make the daily, repeatable, and frequent true meaning a reality for each one of us.

Quit listening to the media that publishes sensationalized stories of war, harm, and other negative bullshit for the purpose of getting eyeballs to their pages.

Get your face out of your phone, or iPad, and actually talk to someone on a deep, genuine and human level … TODAY.

Help a stranger on the street, your neighbor, or someone else who might need help online … without the expectation of something in return.

Don’t believe a word the Government says (at first), because most of the time it takes away from the meaning we all share.

Write, Think, Draw, and share the artistic ability you know you have to share with us. If you’re afraid, you’re not alone.

Etc…

Let’s reclaim our genuine relationships, and quit living lives that marketing, big corporations, and even the Government are dictating that we live.

We’re better than that.

Let’s reclaim that feeling of meaning.