Asking the Big Questions: Meaning, Death, and the Good Life

What Counts as an Existential Question?

An existential question is not just a curiosity about how the world works; it is a question that presses on how you should live, what matters, and how to face limits like uncertainty, loss, and death. These questions feel urgent because they show up when your usual routines stop providing direction—when your plans, roles, or assumptions no longer answer “Why this?” or “For what?”

Existential questions often have three features: (1) they involve value (what is worth doing, loving, sacrificing); (2) they involve identity (who you are becoming through your choices); and (3) they involve finitude (time, mortality, irreversible decisions). They can be discussed rationally, but they cannot be solved by facts alone.

1) Life Scenarios That Generate Questions About Meaning and Value

Scenario A: Career Doubt (Success Without Satisfaction)

You get the job you aimed for. The pay is fine, the title is respectable, and yet you feel oddly flat. Sunday night dread appears. You start asking: “Is this all?”

• Surface problem: boredom, lack of motivation, irritability.
• Existential question underneath: “What would make my work worth doing, beyond salary and approval?”
• Typical hidden conflict: your goals were inherited (family expectations, prestige culture) rather than chosen.

Scenario B: Grief (When the World Stops Making Sense)

Someone dies, or a relationship ends in a way that feels like a death. You can still function, but the background meaning of things collapses. Ordinary activities feel unreal.

• Surface problem: sadness, numbness, anger, disorientation.
• Existential question underneath: “How do I live in a world where what I love can be lost?”
• Typical hidden conflict: wanting life to be safe and controllable while knowing it is not.

Scenario C: Burnout (When Effort Stops Paying Meaning)

You keep pushing—deadlines, caretaking, constant responsiveness. Eventually, even small tasks feel heavy. You may fantasize about disappearing, not necessarily dying, but being unreachable.

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• Surface problem: exhaustion, cynicism, reduced effectiveness.
• Existential question underneath: “What am I doing all this for, and why does it feel empty?”
• Typical hidden conflict: living by urgency rather than importance; confusing being needed with being valued.

Scenario D: Regret (The Irreversible Past)

You look back and see a decision that shaped your life—staying, leaving, choosing a partner, not choosing one, having children, not having them. You replay the fork in the road.

• Surface problem: rumination, self-blame, envy of alternate lives.
• Existential question underneath: “Can my life be good if it could have been better?”
• Typical hidden conflict: treating life like an optimization problem instead of a commitment under uncertainty.

Why These Feel Urgent in Everyday Life

These scenarios are urgent because they combine emotion (grief, dread, fatigue), stakes (time, relationships, identity), and ambiguity (no single correct answer). Everyday life forces decisions even when your worldview is unsettled. Existential questions show up not as abstract puzzles but as pressure to act without guaranteed meaning.

2) A Toolkit of Distinctions

When a question feels huge, it helps to separate what is tangled together. The goal is not to eliminate mystery; it is to make the problem workable.

Distinction 1: Facts vs. Values

Facts describe what is the case. Values express what matters, what is good, what is worth pursuing.

Many existential crises happen when you treat a value problem as if it were a fact problem (“If I just find the right information, I’ll know what to do”), or when you treat a fact constraint as if it were optional (“If I were stronger, I wouldn’t need sleep”).

Distinction 2: Explanation vs. Justification

Explanation answers “Why did this happen?” Justification answers “Why is this worth doing/accepting?”

• Explanation example: “I feel empty because I’ve been isolated and overstimulated.”
• Justification example: “Even with pain, my life is worth living because I can love, create, and contribute.”

Therapy, neuroscience, and social analysis can offer explanations. They may help, but they do not automatically justify. You can fully explain your burnout and still not know what you want your life to be for.

Distinction 3: Happiness vs. Meaning

Happiness is often about felt well-being—pleasure, contentment, low distress. Meaning is about significance—being connected to what you judge worthwhile, even when it is difficult.

• You can be happy but not meaningful: comfortable routines with no sense of purpose or growth.
• You can be meaningful but not happy: caring for a sick relative, training for a demanding goal, grieving while still loving.

This distinction matters because “I don’t feel good” and “My life isn’t worthwhile” are different claims. They require different responses.

Distinction 4: Choice vs. Constraint

Choice is what you can shape through decisions and habits. Constraint is what limits you: finances, health, responsibilities, social conditions, mortality.

• Choice example: how you allocate attention, what you practice, what you say yes/no to.
• Constraint example: needing income, living with chronic illness, being responsible for dependents.

Existential clarity often comes from asking two separate questions: “What is genuinely changeable here?” and “What must be carried, and how?” Confusing them produces either helplessness (treating choices as constraints) or self-blame (treating constraints as choices).

A Quick Diagnostic: What Kind of Question Is This?

Use this mini-checklist when you feel overwhelmed:

• Is this a fact question? “What is actually happening?”
• Is this a value question? “What matters here?”
• Is this an explanation question? “What caused this feeling/situation?”
• Is this a justification question? “What would make this worth it?”
• Is this about happiness? “How do I reduce suffering or increase well-being?”
• Is this about meaning? “What is significant enough to commit to?”
• Is this about choice? “What can I do?”
• Is this about constraint? “What can’t I change, and how do I relate to it?”

3) Guided Exercise: From “What’s the Point?” to Testable Sub-Questions

“What’s the point?” is powerful but vague. Vague questions feel infinite, and infinite questions feel paralyzing. The aim of this exercise is to translate the vague worry into smaller questions you can answer through reflection, conversation, and experiments in living.

Step 1: Write the Vague Worry Exactly as It Appears

In one sentence, without editing, write what your mind says. Examples:

• “What’s the point of working so hard if I’m still anxious?”
• “What’s the point if everyone dies?”
• “What’s the point of trying to be good if it doesn’t change anything?”

Step 2: Locate the Triggering Scenario

Circle the concrete situation that activated the question. Choose one:

• Career doubt
• Grief/loss
• Burnout/overload
• Regret/irreversibility
• Other: __________

Then describe it in observable terms (as if a camera recorded it): what happened, when, who was involved, what you did next.

Step 3: Separate Facts, Values, and Constraints

Create three lists:

• Facts: what is true regardless of your opinion (hours, money, health, events).
• Values: what you care about or believe should matter (care, freedom, excellence, belonging, integrity).
• Constraints: what limits your options (time, obligations, mortality, social conditions).

If you struggle, use prompts: “What would I be sad to lose?” (values) and “What can’t I change this month?” (constraints).

Step 4: Convert the Vague Worry into Four Testable Sub-Questions

Answer each in writing. Keep them specific enough that you could notice evidence in your life.

• (A) Worthwhile-conditions: “What would make this worthwhile?”
• (B) Standards-source: “Whose standards am I using?”
• (C) Tradeoff-clarity: “What am I willing to trade for what?”
• (D) Next-step experiment: “What small action would test this?”

Examples:

Step 5: Check for Category Errors

Review your sub-questions and mark any that are mismatched:

• If you wrote a value question as a fact question, rewrite it (e.g., change “What is the correct life?” to “What do I want to stand for?”).
• If you wrote a constraint as a choice, rewrite it (e.g., change “Why can’t I just stop grieving?” to “How do I grieve while still caring for myself?”).
• If you wrote a justification question as an explanation question, add the missing piece (e.g., “Why do I feel numb?” plus “What would make it worth engaging again?”).

Step 6: Choose One 7-Day Test

Pick one small, reversible action that produces information. It should be measurable and compassionate.

• Boundary test: stop work at a fixed time 3 days this week and note mood/energy.
• Connection test: schedule two conversations with people who make you feel more like yourself.
• Meaning test: spend 60 minutes on an activity you respect (craft, volunteering, learning) and record whether it changes your sense of significance.
• Mortality-salience test: write a one-page “If I had 5 years” plan, then identify one action you can take this month.

Write your test in this format:

For the next 7 days, I will ________ (action) for ________ (time/amount). I will track ________ (one metric: energy, dread, connection, pride, calm). At the end, I will decide ________ (continue, adjust, stop, seek help, change plan).

A Map of the Course Themes (and How We’ll Evaluate Them)

This course returns to three interlocking themes—meaning, death, and the good life—because they shape the background of every major decision. Each theme will be explored through different lenses, but we will evaluate every proposal using the same three criteria.

Theme Map

• Meaning: what makes activities, relationships, and projects significant enough to commit to; how purpose is built, not merely found.
• Death and finitude: how mortality changes priorities, intensifies love and fear, and forces tradeoffs; how to live with impermanence without denial.
• The good life: what it means to live well over time—character, relationships, work, pleasure, responsibility, and integrity under real constraints.

Evaluation Criteria We’ll Use Throughout