So I've deduced that the most important thing in life (see blog on 11.7.2002) is "meaning." The most common answers to that question were love, family, friendship, relationships... what you would expect. I also asked the guy who approached us with the question what he thought. His answer: "truth." Eh, I think even truth has its faults because the interpretation of truth is subject to individual variance. But back to meaning... life is full of activity and information and people and emotions. It isn't until you attribute meaning to these things, though, that they actually affect you and thus have an importance in your life.

So what's my meaning? I am still in the process of figuring that out. I once heard a soc professor speak about how the meaning of life is efficacy. I think there's a lot of value behind that statement. What is important to us is that we are in some way, shape, or form important to someone or something. It can be importance to people, to professions, to disciplines, to culture, to bodies of thought... basically the rest of the world. Perhaps this is why we so often identify ourselves by our profession. "Hello, what's your name? What do you do?" We are defined by what we do; our sense of importance is derived by what we do. We all desire to have an effect.

Efficacy isn't my meaning per se, but it's potentially the basis behind it. I'm searching for the rest. I have experienced though, in the past week, how we affect others in the grandest ways and how we can be so unaware of it. It's seeing another "list" on a friend's blog. It's being asked about #6 in your list by someone you didn't realize actually read your blog. It's getting a letter from an old friend thanking you for something you did years ago. It's finding out that a letter you wrote so many months ago is still being read. It's realizing that you were never the same after something someone else said to you years ago.

We all have so much effect on each other, so much more than we could ever realize.