Some people like to believe that life has no meaning at all, and nothing is real. We call them “teenagers”. Well, maybe “nihilists” is the more correct term, but I don’t know too many functioning adults who truly believe that nothing matters and that there is no purpose in life. I don’t believe that you can be a functioning adult and believe that, never mind being a happy and fulfilled person. So let’s start with the presumption that you are indeed thinking, therefore your consciousness exists. Where do you go from there? Well, first, if you’ve watched The Matrix or read any of the great books that tackle it, you can head towards Solipsism. I recommend you do that, then come back here and read what happens if you start out as absolutely skeptical as possible, trusting only in your own existence and not in the reality your senses feed you.

Seriously, go read it. I’ll wait. It works better if you start from the most skeptical philosophy and work your way up from there.

Okay, so you can start with the principle that you exist, but that’s it, so to speak. You (strictly from a logical standpoint, as I sure as hell don’t actually think this way) don’t start out with the belief that other people exist, because there’s no way of knowing. So it’s you, alone, in a massive computer program you can call “life”.

Well, if this life is all we’ve got, let’s try to figure out what we’re doing here on earth, taking as a given that we get on average seventy-five years to do whatever that is. You can think of it as figuring out the rules and objectives of the game, if you want to. Even though we like to think of ourselves as the highest form of life on this planet, pondering abstract concepts and rationalizing our decisions, the default purpose of our existence is very, very simple. Survival and Replication. That’s what we were designed for. The purpose of our DNA is to perpetuate itself, and particularly with humans, it has done a great job. We have big brains to help us survive the pitfalls of life on this dangerous planet, and we have complex social constructs to help us breed in a way that perpetuates the human genome. Everything we are and everything we do stems in some way from these biological principles. Why do we work? So we can have money to survive, or to attract the opposite sex (I know, I know, cynical, but it’s true), or to provide for our children’s survival. Even though we’re not conscious of it, we are basically programmed with those two goals in mind, and everything we do is a function of that objective. Happy you got into college or got a job? At a base level, it’s because society pounded the message into your head that college will get you a job and a future, which will provide for your expenses and demonstrate high value to a potential mate. So we’re all just a bunch of biological impulses wrapped up in a brain in a skull in a head on a body made of carbon compounds. Congratulations to us humans, the difference between us and other animals is that we’re at least self-aware and realize that we’re born, we copulate, and we die. Other animals don’t have to deal with the discomforting sentiment that comes with knowing and contemplating their own mortality. But more on this later.

So what is the meaning of life, if we’re just running around fulfilling our biological destiny? Well, at a fundamental level, there is none. Nothing objective, at least. Not to be nihilistic, though, the only sustainable solution is that we have to create meaning for ourselves. For some, that’s the external value system called “religion”. Others choose to follow a moral code, or to pursue wealth or knowledge. The bottom line is, though, to aim for achieving maximum enjoyment out of life. What is life, if not a series of experiences that we hope leaves us better than when we entered it?

So if we are all just collections of neurons bumping around in flimsy carbon bodies, then trying to enjoy the time we do have on earth is about all we’ve got. That can be interpreted in many ways, but it brings up an uncomfortable word that many associate with an adolescent outlook on life, and that is hedonism. Most people, when they think of hedonism, think of carnal pleasure, a lack of maturity, a lack of purpose or direction, or generally being a shallow and degenerate human being. Well, that’s really not a fair characterization. A hedonist recognizes that the most important goal in his life is finding what makes him truly happy, and trying to maximize time spent doing that. There is a lot to be said for corporeal pleasures, but some people might find them to be unsatisfying in the long run. I can’t prove nor disprove the existence of any higher purpose for those people, but I can try to appease them by explaining how to be a conscious hedonist.

Basically, you have to recognize what lets you fully realize your goals in life, intellectually, physically, emotionally, sexually, whatever. Of course, a lot of things can give a person enjoyment if that person dedicates time to that activity. The classic example is working out. Lots of people claim to hate working out, but it’s only because they haven’t pushed past the pain and reaped the rewards of a physically fit body, longer, healthier life, more energy, and the endorphins that are naturally released after strenuous physical activity. Or take a career in high-level medical research. Many people would consider researching different proteins and discovering new drugs to be incomprehensible and joyless. For some people, though, it’s like solving a good puzzle, and gives them deep satisfaction to know that they are helping people and advancing human knowledge with their creativity.

The problem we face as disengaged twenty-somethings is that we never really stepped back and took a good, hard look at what our own authentic goals are in life. If we did, then we periodically lose track of them somewhere in the mind-numbing grind of adult life and never stay on track for long. That is why you see people advising that you quit your job, travel the world, and find what you’re truly passionate about. They know that the only way to get out of a rut and move towards these higher goals is to begin to mentally disengage from the taxing requirements and distracting pleasures of a modern American life. That involves upheaval, which is extremely uncomfortable for almost all of us. The uncertainty, the weight of expectation that we pursue the “safe” or “respectable” path, that is what keeps people from contemplating their goals, much less acting on their dreams. That barrier of discomfort prevents growth, which is paramount to happiness.

The truly beautiful part of examining conscious hedonism, though, is the ability to sum up the entire philosophy graphically. What do I mean? Well, a good friend of mine, in a debate we were having over my philosophy, asked, “Why don’t you just go somewhere and overdose on crystal meth or something? You’ll have infinite pleasure for a split second, and then die immediately after. If life is meaningless, you’d be happiest leaving it right now with the greatest high medically possible.” I quickly responded that since life is infinitely preferable to not being alive, I would rather be alive for as long as possible, because that would make me happier than a limitless high followed by death.

It wasn’t until I discussed this with another great philosophical influence, my mom (hi mom!), that she wrapped this idea together with my desire to discipline myself to achieve greater happiness in the long run, like with my diet. She explained it like this. Imagine your life as being a little graph of happiness versus time. Every second, the happiness you feel at that instant gets plotted, and you can never re-write the graph once you’ve lived that moment. Overdosing on heroin would shoot the graph to the sky, and then it would drop to zero a few minutes later when you die. If you live a long life free of drug addiction and rich with purpose, however, your graph will remain naturally high for a longer period of time. For those of you that have taken calculus, you might know what’s coming. The ultimate goal is to maximize the integral of our happiness over time. Yeah, I just included a math analogy in the meaning of life. What this means is that even if we have the little asymptote of instantaneous happiness followed by death of drug overdose, that will give us overall less “area under the graph” of general happiness than living a fulfilling life with spikes of carnal pleasure here and there, but the general satisfaction of a purpose-filled life nonetheless.

Note a few things: Almost everyone has a baseline happiness level that they deviate from in extreme circumstances, but quickly return to it. No, I’ve never done heroin. Yes, from what I’ve read, I believe that it is the purest, “best” feeling in the world, the kind that you want to have forever and ever. You know, the kind that you get addicted to and ruin your life while you chase it. The kind that quickly moves your baseline irrevocably downward, because you start to develop a tolerance. Longer-lasting happiness spikes result from more lasting emotional connections (more on this later). And yes, I was extremely happy for a long time when I got a Game Boy Advance as an eight-year-old. But that’s not the real point here. The point is that, in a simple utilitarian calculation of the sum of your life, the integral of the happiness over time is the most straightforward way to evaluate.

Now, a lot of this thought stems from ideas I had as a more cynical, smart-ass eighteen-year-old. If it resonates with you, good, but there is more to consider. If you hate this philosophy because it seems cold and selfish, bear with me. There is more to consider, some bridges between conscious hedonism and a warmer, love-thy-neighbor philosophy that might make the arguments a bit more palatable.