“I simply don’t see the meaning of all this anymore.”

This is not a foreign thought to most of us. These thoughts seem to become even more acute when we have to deal with feeling disappointed, lost, overwhelmed or stressed out because of all the demands placed on us. A feeling of being trapped on the treadmill of life or of being tired of repeating all the same-old, same-old stuff, day after day, can also lead to such thoughts.
At some stage of our lives, all of us will be searching for some deeper wisdom in order to figure out the meaning of life. Here is a thought: What if it is not something we need to search for? What if it is already built-in by divine design, but we somehow just can’t see it? It is much like looking at a 3D picture: At first glance, it makes no sense. There is nothing to see – until we manage to ‘look deeper’ or ‘differently’, and lo and behold, to our surprise, a beautiful image emerges.

Similarly, to find meaning in life, we first need to be aware that we are in fact living in two worlds – the inner world of the soul, and the outer material world where we spend the bulk of our time and energy. In order to find meaning and to see the sacredness in the outer world, we need to reconnect with the soul. Life feels meaningless to us because, as with looking at a 3D picture, we glance superficially at life and all we see is a seemingly meaningless image. Only when we reconnect with the soul, will another image appear. Only when the two worlds meet, does the magic happen – and this will enable us to recognise the sacred in everyday life again.

When I use the word “the sacred”, I am not referring to something primarily religious or even spiritual. The sacred belongs to the primary nature of all that is. The sacred is not something we need to develop or learn. Our ancestors instinctively knew that everything they could see was sacred. They could see with deep reverence the sacredness, wonder, beauty and divine nature of the world. Sadly, we have largely lost that ability. It is only from this sense of reverence for the sacredness of life, that real meaning and our deepest purpose of being alive are born.

Looking through the lens of the soul, magic and the sacred can be found in any form: a beautiful sunset, the first cry of a newborn child, and the last breath of a dying person. It can be present in a simple meal prepared with love, in the laughter of a family around a table, in the moment someone says “I love you”, in the simplicity of a single candle burning, in a bunch of flowers, in the random kindness of a stranger, in the embrace of two people forgiving each other, in the laughter of a child, in a gentle touch, in a friendly smile, in the vastness of the night sky, in the beauty of a piece of art and in soul-uplifting music, in the majesty of a mountain, in the roar of a lion, in the presence of an old and wise tree, or in watching the tide comes in.

Life is not meaningless. Our lives are not meaningless. Meaning is already ‘in the picture’. We just need to put the soul back into everything we do.