Purpose

An evolving view on purpose.

Artwork by Ruta Krau

This piece (journal entry, rather) is split into two parts, written about two weeks apart.
The first explores how I’ve always flirted with nihilism, and what it means to find beauty without purpose.
The second is a kind of re-entry. An evolution of that thought. A shift from rejecting purpose to appreciating how it can unfold.

I flirt with Nihilism. The whole “nothing matters,” shtick. But then I’ll find deep meaning in a goddamned fern. It doesn’t need a cosmic reason to unfurl its fronds, it just does. Don’t even get me started on bird song out my window. Existing is beautiful precisely because it’s unnecessary, yet here the fuck we are. Everything is beautiful, even in the absence of divine purpose.

Which brings me to definitions. Merriam-Webster defines nihilism as “a belief that life has no meaning or purpose, and that religious and moral principles have no value.” Am I allowed to disagree with a dictionary? Is that definition not imposing the belief that morality is tied to religion, and that the absence of divine purpose equates to emptiness? It lists synonyms like negativity, cynicism, pessimism, and repudiation. But does it ignore the notion of objective truth?

Here’s how nihilism feels to me: not negative, not pessimistic, not a lack at all. Lacking prescribed purpose doesn’t mean life is meaningless. I believe it just means it is. Stripping away imposed obligations leaves room for marvel. Not a void, but freedom.

I understand why religion and nihilism are incompatible, but I cannot accept the idea that lacking purpose, whether individual or universal, is inherently negative. To me, it’s exactly the opposite: it’s permission to notice, to feel, to awe, and to live fully in the fact of existence.

AN EVOLVING VIEW OF PURPOSE

In my original view, purpose was something to be freed from. A weight imposed by religion, morality, or cultural expectation. But my evolving view sees purpose less as something to reject and more as something that emerges.

Something flexible, self-generated. A kind of meaning that grows the way the fern does: silently, naturally, without needing to justify its own existence.

In my current understanding, purpose isn’t given or found—it’s accumulated. Layered through curiosity, creativity, love, and repetition. It is a contribution to the feeling of aliveness.

Perhaps, then, purpose is motion? The act of engaging with life, moving through wonder, creation, contribution. Likely not what we’re aiming at but instead the energy that propels us forward. (At least in how I’m trying to make sense of it.)

Throughout this writing project, and in the conversations that have surrounded it, the word purpose has arisen in an almost taunting way. Creeping into my subconscious, further fueling my need to understand. It has long been long said that one must be open to changing their mind when presented with new information. That belief is the religion I subscribe to. One of perpetual revision, of reshaping meaning as I move through it.

And as with many things in my life, I’ve experienced a shift in defining purpose. I still maintain that I do not believe in an assigned purpose—no cosmic duty or divine design. But I’ve questioned whether the idea itself is synonymous with service, usefulness, or sacrifice. If my purpose doesn’t serve anyone else, is it still valid? Maybe that’s the lingering moral hangover of a culture that equates worth with utility.

If purpose manifests through inherently “selfish” acts- be it writing, reading, moving my body, what is it doing for the world around me? Is self-importance, or simply aliveness itself… enough?

Maybe purpose isn’t the end result of what I create or contribute, but something more like Newton’s Law: the act of staying in motion?

I’ll end that with a question mark. For now.