My partner is taking a class in psychology and one assignment asks her to write a paper answering the question “What makes life worth living?”

For the past few days, she’s been asking the people around her – kids, friends, co-workers – what they think makes life worth living, and the answers have been pretty much of a sort: family, friends, work, music, some possession or other, faith, maybe health. computer games.

Although these answers aren’t necessarily trivial, they strike me as very unsatisfying answers to the question “What makes life wort living?” What about family, friends, work, etc. makes life worth living? Just having them?

Then why aren’t most people – who generally have families, friends, and jobs – happier than they are? Why, indeed, do we live in a society where anti-depressants are among the most profitable medications? Why are the bookstore shelves packed with books explaining how to be happier?

I think there’s a resistance to answering a question like this honestly. Sure, being put on the spot and asked one of the most profound questions humanity has managed to come up with is probably not exactly conducive to thoughtful responses, either, but I doubt she’d get much better responses if she gave them a week to think about it.

It’s the same resistance I see when people talk about the GTD weekly review. We’re pretty much ok with going over our tasks and doing some short-range planning, but when Allen insists we take that “50,000 foot view” of our lives – the Big Picture view – people tend to come up short.

And when Allen insists, over and over in virtually every interview with him I’ve ever heard or read, that we ask ourselves, “Is what I’m doing right now the most important thing I could be doing in my life?” I see the same resistance. Who am I kidding? I feel the same resistance. Maybe I’m cleaning up dog poop in the backyard, or playing BrickBreaker on my Blackberry – is that really the most important thing I could be doing?

Probably not.

But it strikes me as a really important question. What does make life worth living? And I think the reason people answer in such unsatisfying ways is that we’ve grown so used to defining ourselves in terms of possessions – possessions that literally feel like extensions of our self – that it’s hard to think of even the people close to us in any way other than as possessions, as “objects” with certain qualities that make us happy. Or, more often, don’t.

Which is to say, they’re all “things” that are external to us, no matter how much a part of our life they feel like. I think any question of what makes life worth living has to start with an inward look at one’s self, not an outward look at the people and things one surrounds one’s self with.

Instead, I think we need to address the question with our own actions, the things we do that make life worth living. Verbs, not nouns. When I think of how I would answer the question, the following behaviors come to mind:

* Creating: writing, drawing, painting (though I’m not good at it), playing music (though I’m not especially good at that, either). For others, it might be inventing something, building a Business, coming up with a clever marketing campaign, forming a non-profit.

* Relating: It’s not “family” that makes life worth living, I think, but the relationships we create with members of our family, and the way we maintain and build those relationships. Same goes for friends, lovers, Business partners, students, and everyone else.

* Helping: Being able to lend a hand to people in need – however drastic or trivial that need may be – strikes me as an important part of life.

* Realizing: Making, working towards, and achieving goals, no matter what those goals are.

* Playing: Maybe this is a kind of “relating”, but then, play can be a solo affair as well. Letting go of restraints, imagining new possibilities, testing yourself against others or against yourself, finding humor and joy.

* Growing: Learning new things, improving my knowledge and ability in the things I’ve already learned.

Those seem like more satisfying answers to me – they strike deeper into what it is I want for myself, what makes it worthwhile to get up in the morning.

What about you? What makes your life worth living? Do you feel like I’m headed down the wrong path here? How would you answer the question, “What makes life worth living?”

我的朋友在一次上完心理課后，作為家庭作業，老師讓她寫一篇論文來闡述 “什么讓我們的生命充滿意義？”

在過去的這些天里，她不停的她周圍的人——孩子、朋友、同事——什么讓他們的生命充滿意義，答案是五花八門的：家庭、朋友、事業、音樂、財產或其他的東西、信仰、或者健康、計算機游戲。

雖然沒有必要一一陳述這些瑣碎的答案，但是他們的答案讓我大吃一驚，我對他們關于“什么讓你的生命充滿意義？”的回答不敢茍同。家庭、朋友、事業等等就讓我們的生命充滿意義嗎？只是這些嗎？

那為什么大部分逐漸擁有家庭、朋友和工作的人，沒有比以前更加幸福呢？事實上，為什么我們生活的社會中，抗抑郁劑成為利潤最豐厚的治療方法呢？為什么書店的書架上排滿了講解如何可以更加幸福的書籍呢？

我想總是有些事情阻止我們誠實的回答這個問題。是的，當人被放到某一點，然后被問一個人類一直在追尋其答案的高深問題時，這可能并不利于人們去思考這個問題的答案。或者，她應該給那些被問到的人們一周的時間去思考，但是我覺得她仍然不會得到更好的答案。

當人們在談論GTD（Get Things Done! 把事情做完。）周回顧時，我看到了相同的阻力。我們大多滿意我們完成的任務和做出的短期計劃，但是艾倫堅持我們應該對我們的生活有“50000英尺遠的規劃”——一幅宏偉藍圖——人們更喜歡短期完成的計劃。

在對艾倫的每次采訪中，我都會聽到或讀到他的一遍一遍堅持的觀點，即我們要自問，“現在我正在做的事情將會是我生命中做過的最重要的事情嗎？”這時，我看到一樣的阻力。我是在嘲笑誰嗎？我感到了相同的阻力，當我在清理后院的狗糞便時，當我在黑莓上玩敲方塊游戲時——這些真的是我可能正在做得最重要的事情嗎？

或許不是。

然而，這個問題本身也使我震驚。什么讓我們的生命充滿意義？我相信這些理智的人們在回答這個問題時用了讓人不甚滿意的方法——我們長大后習慣以占有物來定義我們自己，而我們自然的認為我們的占有物是我們自身的延伸。即使是我們身邊的人，除了是我們的占有物，我們也難以從其他角度去看待他們，看作是有某種品質的“物品”可以讓我們幸福。或者，太經常，就不是了。

就是說，無論他們在我們的生命中占據了多大的一部分，他們仍然是“物”，是我們生命之外的東西。我認為任何關于什么讓我們的生命充滿意義的問題都應該從審視我們內心開始，而不是從檢查我們周圍的人或物開始。

實際上，我認為我需要用實際行動來回答這個問題，我們做的事情讓我們的生命充滿意義。答案是動詞而不是名詞。當我在思考如何回答這個問題時，下面的這些行為就進入了我的腦海：

創造：寫作、繪畫、噴漆（雖然我并不擅長）、演奏樂器（雖然我尤其的不擅長）。對其他人來說，它可能是發明什么東西，創立一個公司，打了一場聰明的市場戰，行程一個非贏利機構。

聯系：并不是“家庭”讓我們的生命充滿意義。我想，而是我們與家庭成員之間創造的關系，并且把這種關系保存下來并加以鞏固。相同的與朋友之間、愛人之間、事業伙伴之間、學生之間和其他任何人之間。

幫助：盡自己所能去幫助需要幫助的人們——只要可能需要，不管是大災難還是小麻煩——都會被我看作成為生命中的重要部分。

玩耍：玩可能被認為是一種“放松”，但是，玩也是一件獨立的事情。放開約束、展開想象，和別人或者和自己比賽，發現幽默和快樂。

成長：學習新的東西，在已經學過的基礎上不斷提高自己的知識和能力。

這樣的答案看起來更讓我滿意——這些深深進入我內心，這些是我想為我自己做，這些是我每天早晨起床值得做得事。

你的答案是什么呢？什么讓你的生命充滿意義呢？你覺得我的分析有不對的地方嗎？那么你將如何回答“什么讓我們的生命充滿意義”這個問題呢？