Grandma’s ‘thoughts’ on the meaning of life

It is a question I used to ask myself all the time. What is the meaning and purpose of life? I know it is a question that has also been asked by many millions of people around the world and will be asked by they and many more for some time to come. I don’t claim to have the definitive and proven answer, but I do have some insight that Grandma shared with me that if nothing else, has given me a sense of peace. It is all to do with a leap of faith.

My questioning about the meaning of life had been ongoing for many years. It really reached a head about a year before I started the dream groups at a time when I was really struggling with getting any meaning out of my career. Each day I would trudge off to work, sit in meeting after meeting, daydream about winning the lottery and long for the weekends. The only part of the job I enjoyed was collecting my pay each month.

At the same time, I would spend at least some part of everyday asking myself the question; Is this all there is in life? I would also look at the faces of others dragging themselves off to work each day and notice they looked just like me – glum, expressionless and resigned.

One Sunday, I drove past a church and saw the same looks on the faces of people who were in no real hurry to get inside. To me, it looked like a bunch of people going through the motions because they had gone to church all their lives and ‘this is what you do.’ I wondered how many of those churchgoers really believed or really understood why they were going to church. What was the purpose if they didn’t really look forward to going each week? Was there a sense of duty or was it a case of doing the right thing and honouring family tradition?

During that time, I was going through a particularly tough time at work where I didn’t agree with the corporate agenda that was being pursued by my employer. It led me to again ask the question about the meaning and purpose of corporate life and how it can possibly fit in with the plan or agenda of any God, higher being or source.

Not being able to come up with a satisfactory answer myself to my question, I undertook an intense meditation and ‘discussion’ with grandma over the course of several nights. I’ve summarised the key points below:

Me: Why do people look so glum going to church? Why the blank look on people’s faces on their way to work?

Grandma: Why indeed!

Me: Is that a riddle for me to solve?

Grandma: You’re not happy darling?

Me: Well, I know you encourage me to work things out for myself but sometimes I would be pleased with a straight answer when I ask for help. This is not easy and I am tired.

Grandma: Tired?

Me: Tired of the struggle to understand how I could be talking with you and struggling with understanding what on earth is the purpose of all the corporate rubbish and struggle in the world generally.

Grandma: Like many, or most, you are struggling with the question of purpose and what you are.

Me: I’m frustrated. I feel like I have it all materially but feel like I have nothing inside me.

Grandma: You do have something inside you. You just have shut it in a box and need to let it out.

Me: Please grandma. No riddles. I’m really tired.

Grandma: Darling, when you were born, when any human being is born, they come into the world made up of many parts. But most of all, there are two equally strong components that influence who they are and what they do while on earth.

Me: Their brain and the influence on their personality I guess.

Grandma: No. It is their soul and their ego. From shortly after the time of conception, from the early stage of growth of a foetus, the soul and ego are growing as well. Humans often talk about children being an old soul or seemingly having lived before. The reason that is so apparent in small children is that the soul is stronger than the ego prior to and immediately post birth.

Me: The physical growth of the baby in the womb I can understand and I also  understand the genetic input and influence via the parents but how can ego be developing from before birth when surely the outside influences post birth along with other environmental and developmental factors are the only key factor of how a person develops.

Grandma: It is much deeper and more involved than that. The ego is a combination of external influences as you say along with the individuals own personality. It is more apparent as one grows older but it is there before birth in any case. But the soul is the key hidden influence and that’s what I want you to remember as the most important message. All humans are born with a soul, a spirit that lives inside them and helps guide and shape that person. It is a leap of faith to accept this. Science and humanity is a long time away from being able to understand and comprehend.

Me: I find it impossible to believe that all people have souls. Even if the concept is true, what about mass murderers, surely they have no soul?

Grandma: No, all are born with souls or a hidden spirit from the other side. A person’s ego, the environment they live in, their personality and genetic mistakes can all lead to a situation where the soul is overwhelmed to the point where ego, personality and genetic misfortune take control or are allowed to take control.

Me: So it is a random lottery how we turn out?

Grandma: It can be to an extent but the soul can easily lead the way and overcome all other factors if the will is there. For some people, it is easy for the soul to be the dominant factor in the make up of how one lives a life on earth in preparation for the next life. For others, it isn’t easy and it takes enormous courage, faith and hard work to overcome the other dominant factors. For some, to use your examples of a murderer, it is too much to overcome.

Me: This is a lot to accept and take in!

Grandma: It is for all. That is what is meant by having faith. We will cover more of this as time goes by.

Me: Just to come back to faith then.  Why the long faces at church, why the glum faces about our jobs and lives?

Grandma: Have you ever wondered about people who are just happy in everything they do? Ever wondered about people who seemingly have little, have what you would see as boring jobs, mundane lives, yet they seem to glow?

Me: Yeah, I don’t get it.

Grandma: They are the ones that have found the balance between soul and ego. Please remember that ego is not bad. A healthy ego that is mature and focused on the right things is part of the make up of a human on earth. It allows the person to have the necessary drive and purpose to fulfil a role on earth, no matter what that role is. The unhappy faces, the feeling of emptiness that you talk about is because the balance between ego and soul is again out of step. Having the right balance of ego and soul is not easy. Ego is driven by what you can see and feel as a human. Therefore it is easy to follow. Soul can’t be seen so requires a leap of faith to believe it is something worth following or doing. As a human, it is easier to ignore what we can’t see or experience.      

Me: Well surely people who go to church have faith so why aren’t they happy?

Grandma: Religion of any sort is an attempt to connect with the spirit. There is nothing wrong with any religion that seeks to connect with the next life as long as it is well intentioned and does not use force or coercion. Where people get lost is in the belief that prayer or attendance at church without an intention to connect with the spirit will lead to a feeling of balance between ego and soul or if they are really attending at church to placate the ego. Prayer of any kind or attendance at any venue to connect with what some people call God is a genuine attempt to connect your soul and the next life with the source. However, it is not necessary to go to a building with others or undertake ceremony to balance the ego and the soul or connect with the soul and therefore achieve balance and prepare for the life after. If it helps and the right intention is there that balances soul and ego, this will work wonders for some people. For others they have the strength and ability to go within via meditation and find the balance with or without the guidance of those that have lived before and who are part of the afterlife.

Me: It is all too much. I can’t ever hope to understand this you know.

Grandma: I know that some things you will understand. The rest is faith and your soul and ego will accept these in the years ahead. Like those that do accept that there is something beyond human life without at all being able to see it, allow your soul to take the lead.