How to live a meaningful life | Brian S. Lowery (re-release)

0:06You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hu. We are continuing to share a handful of talks, conversations, and episodes from the TED Archive that we hope will spark some inspiration as we think about the end of the year and the resolutions and practices we hope to bring into this new year. It's a small and big question at the same time. What makes for a meaningful life? In this beautiful archive talk, social psychologist Brian S. Lowry explores three ideas tied to the experience of meaning. and shows why simply pursuing personal achievements isn't the best way to find it.

0:54Life is amazing. Life is incredible. The experiences we have, the possibilities of personal achievement. You could summit Everest. You could create a huge successful business. You could give a TED Talk. and when you're successful it feels incredible success, the flush of excitement the celebration and you should celebrate the congratulations, the posting on Instagram wherever you put your stuff up it all feels great but when that fades, when that starts to fade sometimes slowly, sometimes all at once a question comes up is this it? is this all there is? And so I'm going to tell you a little story about myself to give you a sense of this.

1:44So for those of you who don't know, I'm a professor at Stanford. When I got my job, I was elated, elated, and a little bit terrified. And I was terrified because when you get a job like that, you know you're going to be reviewed in about seven years. And either you're going to be given tenure, more or less a job for life, or you're going going to get fired. It's a little bit like that movie, Glen Gary, Glen Ross, the scene where Alec Baldwin's character goes in to give the motivational speech, and he says, it's going to be a competition. First prize, Cadillac El Dorado. Second prize, set of steak knives.

2:27Third prize, you're fired. It's a little bit like that, except there's no second prize. And it turns out, as you might imagine that has a way of focusing your mind. So I was really, really focused on doing good research, getting my papers published, doing it on the classroom, and all the other little things you need to do to get tenure. And seven years later, I made it. I made it. Thank you. And it was a huge relief, and I was so excited. I was so excited. But that question came up. Is this it? Is this really all there is? And I reflected back and I thought about the time I spent in undergrad, five years in grad school, the tears, and there were a lot of tears, the seven years of trying to get tenure.

3:24And I had expected, I had hoped that when I made it past that, when I succeeded, when I went through that threshold, life would feel different. I would feel fulfilled. It would feel meaningful to me. My life would feel meaningful. But it turns out that wasn't what happened. Now, when psychologists talk about meaningfulness in life, what they're talking about is a sense that our lives matter, that the world makes sense, that we are more than the sum of our minutes, days, and years on this planet. Now, the research on meaningfulness in life suggests there are three big ideas associated with meaningfulness in life.

4:04The first big idea is coherence. The world needs to feel coherent. After winter comes spring, after spring comes summer, you get up in the morning, you brush your teeth, you have breakfast, you get the kids off to school, you go to work. Those little routines make the world feel knowable, predictable, coherent. Now, when you think about personal achievement, it does create sometimes this experience of coherence because we achieve within a framework. I understood what they expected of me for tenure. I understood that if I got my papers published, that I did well in the classroom, that I talked to the right people, I did all the networking, there was a good chance I could tenure.

4:46If you're trying to lose weight, you understand. If you change your diet, you exercise, the weight will come off, or at least we hope so. Now, those things, that framework, gives the world a sense of coherence. Second big idea associated with meaningfulness in life, Second big idea, purpose. Purpose. Now, sometimes people use the term purpose as a synonym for meaning in life. And that's not how I mean it here. Purpose is a way of thinking about what your life can be and should be in the future. It's a way of directing your actions. It gives you goals. When you get up in the morning, you know what you need to do.

5:27Here's where the drive for personal achievement is strongest. It's clearest. When I was worried about tenure, I knew exactly what I need to do when I got up in the morning. When you have a goal, when you're trying to achieve something, you have a clarity about what you should do, how to direct your behavior. So that's the second big idea is purpose. Now, the third big idea, by many considered to be the most important, is significance. Now, the way I like to think about significance is the sense that you can transcend yourself, that you are more than what you are right now, that you will continue to matter into the future beyond this moment.

6:06This is where I think personal achievement falls short. By definition, personal achievement focuses on you, to focus on the self. And if that's all there is, it's difficult to have significance. So when I want to think about meaningfulness in life and significance in particular, it brings to mind a quote attributed to Leonardo da Vinci. Some of you might know it. So Leonardo da Vinci was purported to have said on his deathbed, I have offended God and mankind because my work did not achieve the quality it should have. now i wasn't there so i don't know if he said that exactly in that way but here's the thing you can imagine it you understand it you understand what it means to have even the most glorious achievements and still ask is this enough is this it is this all i add up to

7:07when i look back and think about my time early on in my career i think about when did it feel meaningful? What gave me a sense of meaning? What I think about were my PhD students. So one of the things that faculty do is train the next generation of faculty. And so you have PhD students, and you have them for a significant amount of time, often could be five to six years, and the relationships are pretty intense. So let me tell you about my first student, Miguel Ansueta. So Miguel was born in El Paso, Texas, in a relatively low-income area, really smart kid, does well in school, ends up at the University of Texas at Austin, which is a great university, does well there, eventually ends up in the PhD program at Stanford.

7:49So Miguel gets there the year before I do, and by his own account, he's having a tough time. It's a little rough, and it's rough in part because he doesn't have the cultural capital that many people that go places like Stanford have. He doesn't understand how the place works, so he's struggling a little bit. Now, when I arrive, I'm really impressed because he's so smart. He's ambitious. And he's asking questions and interested in things that I'm interested in. So I'm really excited to work with him. And so we started to work together. And again, it's really intense. I'm working with him for four years.

8:19We see each other almost every day, almost every day for those four years. And some days we're working together 10 to 12 hours a day. So it's a very intense experience. And what I remember about that time was that I was really worried about doing enough to make sure he would be successful. I was concerned. Am I being a good advisor? Am I giving him what he needs? Am I helping him in his story? Now, keep in mind, I want to get tenure. I still think I'm going to get fired. So even with that fear, I'm worried about what do I need to do to make sure Miguel can continue in his story and his journey?

8:58And by the way, he's been great. He got a job. He's been a professor now for over 15 years. at UCLA. He's had serious leadership roles at his university, and I'm incredibly proud that I got a chance to be a little part of that. What do I take from that? What I take from that is that relationships are what provide us meaning. And my guess is you already knew that. I'm saying something a little bit more than that. Not just that relationships provide meaning, but that being a part of a story that is not your own provides meaning. Being a part of a story that is not your own provides meaning. So where does this leave us?

9:44One, I think personal achievement is great. I love my personal achievements. I'm really happy with my life. I think it's turned out okay. I wish incredible personal achievements for all of you. So I think that personal achievement is fantastic. However, sometimes we replace the deep human need for meaning with chasing of personal achievement. And it's a problem when we confuse those two things. And the reason they get confused, the reason it's easy to confuse them, is because personal achievement is easy to quantify. You know if you got that job. You know if you bought that home. You know what your salary is.

10:26It's easy to see. And it feels comfortable to chase things you understand and you can achieve. That's one reason. The other reason is that personal achievement feels good. Personal achievement feels good. What we want, we think we want is happiness, and personal achievement provides a hit of happiness. It feels fantastic when you make that achievement. Getting meaning doesn't necessarily feel that way. For example, studies find that parents who spend more time parenting their children report more meaningfulness in life, but not necessarily more happiness. So these things are not the same. So if you want more meaning in life, what is there to do?

11:07One, look for opportunities to participate in others' stories. You might try a little supporting actor energy, if you want meaning. Play a supporting role in other people's lives. That's number one. Two, accept that the pursuit of meaning may not generate happiness. The pursuit of meaning might not generate happiness. In fact, it might be uncomfortable. It turns out that meaning is more associated with the self providing for others than providing for you or yourself. And that's sometimes a hard thing to do. Expending effort, emotional energy on behalf of something that is not going to return happiness is not something that we tend to think of as a good use of our time.

11:58But it turns out it does produce meaning. So let me say just a couple more things. One, I think the human need and pursuit of meaning is both beautiful and profound because when you have meaning in your life, that means that someone else gave you the opportunity to participate in the story that is not your own. and for that, for the meaning you have in your life you should feel a deep gratitude a deep gratitude for the people who have allowed you to participate in the story that was not your own on the other side when you allow people to participate in your life you're giving them the opportunity to generate meaning and so in that way the deep, deep human need for meaning connects us in a circle I think a beautiful and profound circle of generosity and gratitude.

12:58And so right now here, I'm deeply grateful that you all have let me participate in your stories. That's deeply meaningful for me. Thank you for that.

13:14The theme of this conference is the brave and the brilliant. I think that one way that we can experience or be brave is by accepting the fact that our personal achievements, what we're capable of, the things that we've done, pale, pale in comparison to the effect we have on other people and what that does in the world.

13:45And that as you go through the world with all of your brilliance, and I mean that in terms of light, as you go through the world lighting the world, when you interact with other people and you illuminate them and help them shine more brightly, that's how the world gets illuminated. That's how we bring up the lights. And the world obviously desperately needs that. And in return, what you get is meaning because when we're gone, all of the accomplishments will mean nothing. The only thing that will be left of you when you're gone, and we all will be gone eventually, the only thing will be left of you is the role you played in other people's stories, what you leave with other people, how that reverberates through time.

14:28And that is a beautiful thing. And I wish all of that for you. Thank you.

14:40That was Brian S. Lowery speaking at TED 2024. If you're curious about TED's curation, find out more at ted.com slash curation guidelines. And that's it for today. TED Talks Daily is part of the TED Audio Collective. This talk was fact-checked by the TED Research Team and produced and edited by our team, Martha Estefanos, Oliver Friedman, Brian Green, Lucy Little, and Tonsika Sungmarnivong. This episode was mixed by Lucy Little. Additional support from Emma Taubner and Daniela Ballarezzo. I'm Elise Hu. I'll be back tomorrow with a fresh idea for your feed. Thanks for listening.

15:23Thank you.