What Really Matters
Metadata
- Author: Jen Hitze
- Full Title: What Really Matters
- Category:articles
- Summary: This text emphasizes the importance of understanding our values and purpose in life, as these choices shape our happiness and relationships. It argues that true meaning comes from our actions and connections with others, rather than material possessions. Ultimately, accepting ourselves and pursuing what truly matters can lead to a more fulfilling life.
- URL: https://www.5bigideas.com/p/what-really-matters
Highlights
- Choosing your values and committing to them is not for the faint of heart. It’s far simpler to just adopt the values of others or to follow societal norms than to decide what truly matters to you. (View Highlight)
- To live by your values is to live the “examined life” that Socrates spoke of. And that’s a life worth living. (View Highlight)
- I believe we all have a purpose (or several) that is intertwined with our life lessons and our gifts. (View Highlight)
- Because if we don’t figure out what we’re here to learn and do, we’ll end up chasing things that are meaningless to us. (View Highlight)
- Translated loosely as “a reason for being,” your ikigai lies at the intersection of what you love, what you’re good at, what the world needs from you, and what you can offer in exchange for value. (View Highlight)
- Our bodies need a purpose to function properly. When we lose sight of our purpose and the meaning in our lives, we lose vitality. (View Highlight)
- We remember that those who don’t love us as we are don’t deserve us. (View Highlight)
- We’re happiest when we’re actively engaged in solving problems. Happiness, therefore, is not something that happens to you; it’s something that you do. It’s ambition, application, action. It’s finally getting into a flow state while working on a problem you’ve been avoiding. It’s seeing tiny bits of progress as each day passes, and anticipating tiny bits of progress in the days to come. It’s about sowing seeds and savoring the fruits of your labor. (View Highlight)
- Marianne Williamson so masterfully puts it in A Return to Love,
Meaning doesn’t lie in things. Meaning lies in us. When we attach value to things that aren’t love—the money, the car, the house, the prestige—we are loving things that can’t love us back. We are searching for meaning in the meaningless. Money, of itself, means nothing. Material things, of themselves, mean nothing. It’s not that they’re bad. It’s that they’re nothing. (View Highlight)
- Five Remembrances from Buddhist philosophy. They are:
- We are of the nature to grow old
- We are of the nature to become ill
- We are of the nature to die
- We are of the nature to lose everything and everyone we hold dear
- Our only true possessions in life are our actions, we cannot escape the consequences of our actions (View Highlight)