Modern life is designed around consuming comfort and pleasure. 

From careers to relationships to food and entertainment…

We arrange our world to avoid discomfort.

We kinda know this isn’t fulfilling, but we do it anyway.

I’m not saying this is wrong.

I’ve just worked with a lot of people at the end of success, reaching the highest levels and no matter how much they have, the problem is not solved.

Have all the success you want—just be in a place where you’re fully present, enjoying life, not waiting for it to save you.

We’ve built our lives around a fleeting, unreliable foundation: emotion.

Our emotions carry so much potency, they cause us to endlessly loop, hoping one day we’ll get the combination just right and finally be able to unlock “static” contentment.

Lost in our neurology, it shapes our worldview, influencing how we perceive danger, opportunity, and our own abilities.

When we see the world as overwhelming, we scramble to the external—money, status, food, alcohol, distractions—to calm our minds.

Yet, this only deepens the cycle of survival, not fulfillment.

The alternative? Transcending the self.

Meaning to realize self and a state of fulfillment coexist but are separate…

I know, this is often misunderstood.

Hence the countless spiritual egos.

This idea is embedded in spiritual traditions across the world.

Buddhism and Hinduism teach that suffering comes from attachment—to desires, fears, and the illusion of self.

Fulfillment is found in detachment, in seeing beyond the ego’s endless wants.

Christianity teaches that a meaningful life is one of service and love—not solely because helping others is virtuous in itself, but it has another purpose which is to shift the focus away from the ego and toward others.

I’m not here to get the Buddhist, Zen or Christian philosophy over. 

Just to demonstrate that across traditions, the message is the same: freedom comes not from feeding the self, but from moving beyond it.

Therefore, a meaningful life is a life of contribution.

Think about this for a minute. 

Or better yet…

What does thinking about it make you feel?

Thinking is always done through existing beliefs—so this might rub up against those existing beliefs a bit.

Just bear that in mind as you continue reading.

We are tangled within this.

Centering our lives around our own gratification keeps us stuck in survival mode.

There can never be enough gratification—our emotional system is designed to drive behavior, not to be satisfied. 

If we ever actually arrived, that whole system would collapse.

When we commit to something beyond ourselves—when we lead, create, and serve—we step into a higher way of being.

The ego becomes secondary to something else.

Think about it, the best leaders don’t make it about themselves – they create environments where others thrive.

They lift, inspire, and challenge the people around them to be their best.

A life of meaning works the same way.

Instead of structuring our existence around avoiding fear and pain, what happens when we step outside of emotion?

Driven not by survival, but by giving to something greater than ourselves?

You don’t always get your goals, but you always get your standards.

The question is: what standard are you setting for a meaningful life?

Emotions will always flood your body but do you drown in them?

The shift from fear to fulfillment isn’t just a mindset—it’s a practice.

A practice of being beyond, above, separate from. 

Imagine a constant immediate state of forgiveness and compassion.

What would that look like?

You definitely wouldn't be able to go through the endless cycle of defending an egoic construct which in essence doesn't actually exist.

The gift is not to believe that we are the central character.

Can you imagine the relief to not have to constantly defend, prove and perform?

It doesn't mean you don’t care immensely for your hominid and have compassion for your entanglement of beliefs, but you just don’t live by philosophy as a framework to grasp to.

I’m not saying this is easy!

But why isn’t it?

We hold grudges and anger as if we will lose ourselves if we don’t.

It begs the question, what is this self you would lose?

It’s just interesting to me, why we do this.

Can you see how this plays out in your life?

Live fully,

Paul Vincent

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