Rush Hour Traffic
What can the pain of slowly trudging in your car from 3:00 to 7:00 teach us of life and its many convoluted meanings? This immense traffic shows that the meaning of life in not necessarily in just getting to our destination. In that exact moment when you are sitting in your car, waiting for the line to move forward, you are either longing for Home. THis traffic is the time before the time at home. Traffic is a kind of a no stress period, where you can rest and be alone and you can recuperate before having to deal with whatever stresses (or pleasures) that await in your domain. Rush Hour Traffic shows how we can find meaning in our life through not doing anything and appreciating the space between spaces. Our life doesn't end and should not end when we are in slowed down period, maybe it suggests that life has meaning because it just does, or just because it can. The meaning of life is the quest to make meaning therein.
Myths
“Myths are clues to the spiritual potentialities of the human life,” explains scholar Joseph Campbell. I couldn't agree with this statement anymore. We create myths to make sense of the cloudy areas of our lives. Myths are the effect of our desire to answer the "big question". But maybe here is where we will find the answer. Maybe this is what we are meant to live for. It is possible to speculate that the meaning of life is to make or find it a suitable meaning. What does that achieve in the very end? Only the Gods can know.
Up (film)
The meaning of life is to find what makes you happy. The main character Carl Fredricksen, an old man, has trouble finding purpose in his life after the death of his wife. He is eventually forced out of his house under fraudulent circumstances. He then decides to complete a dream adventure that he had planned with his wife of having their house by some falls in South America. In that instance, his connections to his past wife are what still motivate him to live on. Later, a young boy Russell, accompanies him and they share a bond. In the end, Carl is willing to give up the dream he had made with his wife for being with this boy. As you may have noticed, Carl's purpose to live on is rooted in his connections with his wife and later on Russel. It's fair to say then that it is these very connections that give our lives meaning.
I Am Ali (documentary)
In this documentary, various tape recordings and videos made by Ali himself are assembled to tell his life story. On several occasions, he would record simple conversations with his children and other loved ones, saying that in the future, it would mean so much more. Is it possible that the meaning of life can be found in making other's happy?
The Maze Runner (book)
A group of boys are forced to live in a maze full of danger and loss. They have no connections with their past and know only each other. Despite all their hardships, they all fight to stay alive. Several meanings to the "big question" can be derived from this. Maybe the meaning is found in those connections they share with their fellow maze mates. A broader, alternate, interpretation of this world could be that they found meaning in purpose: their lived on to escape the maze and find out who they really were.
Religion and Heaven or Hell (specifically Christianity)
The "big question" can be observed from the standpoint of the afterlife. With the universe taken from the framework provided in christian teaching, we are judged by the actions we are a part of in this life and if we are worthy we will go to heaven and if not then hell. The meaning of life can be more clearly seen from the eyes of god himself (obviously), the maker of life. We are all born with a place for us in heaven, but how can He know if we are truly deserving of this seat if we are living in paradise from the very beginning? You test the strength of a branch by bending it and applying adversity. So in this context, it is possible that the meaning of our lives is to simply test our worthiness of eternal paradise -- not to experience paradise.