Written by / First Psychology Writers
Editor / Tommy
Everyone has to deal with life's challenges, but the source of motivation varies from person to person.
Young children often don't know what life really means, and their world revolves around schoolwork and happiness;
Middle-aged people who have experienced a lot have to face all kinds of unavoidable life, and their lives are often unsatisfactory;
For the elderly, they have experienced various changes in life, and at this time, they are more interested in the peace and enjoyment of life in their later years.
Therefore, in fact, many people's lives are very purposeful, and it is difficult to find people who live purely for themselves.
In the field of psychology, this phenomenon is known as "cost attribution".
This concept explains the individual's inner needs and values at the expense of his or her own inner needs and values in order to gain social or other recognition.
When an individual is in conflict with the outside world, he marginalizes his inner needs and focuses his attention on matters that meet external expectations.
Socrates, the ancient Greek philosopher, once pointed out,
An unthought-out life is worthless.
What distinguishes human beings from other creatures is our ability to think.
For many people, life itself is challenging, and they often complain about the hardships of life and feel helpless.
For others, life is rich and fun. If we explore the greatest meaning of life, it is undoubtedly that
1. The meaning of life and loneliness
According to the existential point of view,
Although humans are animals, we have a unique ability to think and reason.
Existential psychology emphasizes that rationality is the cornerstone of human existence.
If a person's life is only to survive for the sake of survival, then his life is no different from that of an ordinary animal, which is a sad life.
A truly meaningful life is one in which he can leave traces of his existence.
From the perspective of this school, the ultimate goal of human life is self-realization, by giving full play to the uniqueness of the individual, creating one's own value in a limited life, influencing others, and even changing the lives of others.
Psychologist Erving Aaron once proposed that people will inevitably face several core propositions in their lives:
Responsibility, the value of life, loneliness, and the contemplation of death.
Loneliness is a deep inner experience.
Yaaron believes that even after we have established an intimate relationship, it is possible to feel lonely and lonely.
This is because each person is an individual, and it is difficult for our life experiences and inner feelings to be fully shared or understood.
In addition, each of us encounters many personal problems and challenges that we need to face and solve on our own, which increases our loneliness.
One might think that we are not alone since we are always accompanied by many people in our lives.
However, when loneliness strikes, we find that we are still alone at heart, and no one can help us bear this loneliness.
Therefore, the task of coping with this emotion should be borne by ourselves.
Even if a person's life ends, his impact may still be there and continue to play a role.
For example, the touching animated film "Dream Quest" released at the end of 2017, which is based on the Latin American "Day of the Dead" setting, tells a powerful story.
It shows us that the value of a person lies not only in his survival, but also in the memory and nostalgia of those around him.
Your life will truly come to an end when the chapter of your life will eventually come to an end, and those who remember you will gradually forget you.
As the old Chinese saying goes:
To avoid suffering, the philosopher Schopenhauer proposed,
Life is essentially a collection of desires.
He believed that when these desires were not satisfied, people would feel pain.
While Schopenhauer's views may be slightly extreme, the existence of suffering is undeniable.
2. Pursue self-worth
The pursuit and realization of self-worth is what many psychologists consider to be the "superlative" task in life, as Maslow, the psychologist who proposed the hierarchy of needs theory, emphasized.
Therefore, for us, the search for and realization of the value of one's life is like climbing a mountain, and the joy of experiencing pain is incomparable.
When we are at the end of our lives, when we look back on our lives, we think not only about the small things we do, but also about the precious treasures we have left to the people around us, our families, and even the entire human race.
According to Maslow's theory, we first need to meet basic physiological needs before pursuing the ultimate value of life.
Everyone's definition of happiness is different, some people think that having a lot of wealth is happiness, some people think that creating a work of art is happiness, and some people think that writing a good article is happiness.
The definition of happiness varies from person to person.
However, defining happiness is not the most crucial, but more important is our mood and feelings in the pursuit of happiness.
As long as we experience that pleasure, then we can be said to have fulfilled the meaning of life.
Therefore, we don't have to define the so-called value of life too rigidly, nor do we have to stick to a certain way of life, what matters is the individual's feelings and experiences.
As Paul Kochagin said:
"A man's life should be spent in such a way that when he looks back, he will not regret his inaction, nor will he be ashamed of the time he wasted. ”
The End -
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Keywords in this article: life, psychology
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