Edited and Updated Draft

We're always searching for something to make our lives "complete" and it seems to me that people have fixated on an idea of what it means live a meaningful life that will bring fulfillment to them. This idea is something that we take in from our culture and shapes our definition of what meaning is. There are different views as to what that is, but many of them have the same idea because we base what we think from what we know, which is our culture. It’s like a cycle that is repeated with each generation and as the times change, it is tweaked but stays basically the same. A lot of the times the messages we get from different sources are contradictory and it’s up to us to choose what we want to take in and what we don’t want apart of our psyche. Big Subculture, Corporate Culture, and Folk Culture are sources from where we get ideas of how to live a good and meaningful life.
This isn't exactly a bad thing, because we have to get our ideals, and thought processes from somewhere, and if not from media, we would probably be influenced by something else, like society. During a time in the 20th century when technology had not progressed like it has now, the culture's message was based on society and to a large part, religion which is part of the Big Subcultures. Since the message was that Men were seen as better or at a higher status then women (interpreted from the bible by men), everyone thought that it was true and abided by that train of thought. Culturally speaking, meaningful was a woman staying home by the hearth and taking care of the children. Girls grew up like that excepting that eventually when they come to a certain point of their lives they will settle down and take care of the children. So, for a long time it was like that before someone thought to question the way it has always been. Change in what we think is meaningful or not is largely due to circumstance, and circumstance demanded for change. When World War I came alot of the men were drafted. Because of the large demand of jobs and not enough men to fill the positions, it was women who for the first time were accepted into the work force in large numbers. This expanded their views because as that became acceptable what was meaningful started to change for women. That they have this opportunity, our culture had to adapt and accept that meaning can be found at work too and that settling down isn't necessarily the only way to a meaningful life. Like that meaning can change and adapt to include our circumstances. Even now, we still get the idea that settling down and starting a family is part of what we should do to have a meaningful life, but it is not limited to just that idea anymore.

Even though my idea of a meaningful life is partial to what media and society tells me, I can decide what I want to believe, because otherwise its just taking in things mindlessly without questioning whether its true or not and applying it mindlessly as well. There are messages that strike true for me and there are messages that I do not believe in at all, like . To me a meaningful life is very much apart of what relationships we create and shape with others. It’s also contentment and

"Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art... It has no survival value; rather is one of those things that give value to survival." - C. S. Lewis.

Human connection is very innate. Even as children we start forming relationships with our family or friends. Part of that is through imitation, but the other part is inimitable, the feelings we draw from it. That is something that many people would agree to be meaningful, whether it come from family of friends.

Corporate Media sends us many different messages on what it means to live a meaningful life. Because Corporate Bias is owned by corporations, messages are often reported in a way that oftentimes favors the interests of the owners of news media or its advertisers. In ads from corporate message, they show us an image of what we should want and what we should be, by suggesting that this is what we are not, and that we can be that by buying their products. These kinds of ads play on people's insecurities and works, simply by saying that we need it for our lives to be meaningful. “Advertisements sell a lot more than products. They sell values, images, and concepts of success and worth, love and sexuality, popularity and normalcy. They tell us who we are and who we should be” (Kilbourne). They tell us what is or is not meaningful in life through these ideas of “success and worth, love and sexuality, popularity and normalcy”.

If you look in any magazine there are ads that tell us to buy something. One such ad can be found in Businessweek, Nov. 10, 2008 issue, on page 72 where we can see a picturesque scene of roomy indoor cabins and red wine in a plane, decorated in a comfy and luxurious way. This ad, like many others, sends the message that money and luxury is part of having a meaningful life, being able to afford "the best" means that we are successful. The ad talks about how it is the 'greenest' in its class playing on a trend towards caring for the planet. Being from corporate media the ad is aimed to get consumers and does that by sending the message that lavishness and extravagance will grant us that.

Even the music videos that are watched in entertainment send us a message that having alot of money to buy things with is important to living a good and meaningful life. In The Good Life by Kanye West the video is basically telling people that having a good life equates to having money and women. Fame and popularity and having everyone know you and being "better" than everyone else is part of living the good life, and that he has that and he is living the good life. When he sings "shit, they say the best things in life are free" its saying that obviously money and the things you can buy with them are better, "And watch the money pile up, the good life" add that money is conducive to having a good life. He also shows that women are part of it, "And she got the goods/And she got that ass, I got to look" but it seems kind of superficial because he only mentions her body and not any other attributes besides that. Having everyone know him and about him is part of the message too "Now I, I go for mine, I got to shine/Now throw your hands up in the sky/Now I, I go for mine, I got to shine/Now throw your hands up in the sky" This kind of shows that, because the people, his fans, are there to listen to his music and to him "shine". The images support the theme and message of the video by showing Kanye over a crowd of people at the same time the lyrics sing "Now throw your hands up in the sky/Now I, I go for mine, I got to shine", and many of images of women, cheerleaders, a woman in a low-cut shirt, etc. There are pictures of money piling up, and of different places he can go to like LA or New York, or Miami because he has all this money.

"Welcome to the good life
Where we like the girls who ain't on TV"

Its funny to them the "good life" starts where they no longer want the "hot" models on TV all the boys go after and the other messages usually tell people that those are the girls other girls want to be like and boys want to "get with".
"I don't think he should
50 told me go 'head switch the style up
And if they hate then let 'em hate"

He no longer thinks the criticisms of others is important. It’s a good message because you can't control how others will think of you, so accepting that what will happen will happen makes it a lot easier when it does happen. The good life is the point where you can "do as you will".

Strangers, Family, and Friends all have different views on the meaning of life. For this project we had to ask people who we knew well and people we didn’t really know at all what their perspective on meaning was. I asked them what they defined meaning as, what they found to be a meaningful part of their lives, and how they much meaning they thought they had in their lives.

People seem to see it along the same lines on what is or is not meaningful. Almost all the people I've talked to say that family is a very meaningful part of life, one or two add that "human connection or being part of the larger community" is also something that is meaningful as well. When asked what made family, or friends so meaningful to them, a middle aged man said that it was because of everything that they have shared together and how they supported each other and just the love, which was along the same lines of 1/4th of the people I have asked had said. They found their lives to be pretty meaningful, people who were able to scale the meaning in their lives all said it was a 7-10 based on what they found was meaningful. The people who felt that they have fulfilled or already had what they thought was meaningful in their lives tended to think their lives were more meaningful. I thought this was interesting because one lady we met who was walking her dog said something that connected to this point. We had asked her whether she viewed her life as more meaningful than someone else's and she said that while happiness and security was meaningful to her life everyone needs different things to fulfill them and because of that it's up to them to determine. When viewed in this way meaning is something that is subjective because it is a personal matter.

2/8ths of the people interviewed mentioned goals as something they found as meaningful because it gave them a feeling of accomplishment and having goals and reaching those goals were rewarding. I thought about this and if meaning is viewed in goals, you would never be complete of have a “10” on the meaning scale because you are always striving to reach that goal, but once you’ve reached it your done, and you no longer have a goal because it is complete. I think goals are good, so if meaning were to be defined like this, a person must constantly make new goals for themselves to reach.

A small consensus of people found that catty people who judge other people were a meaningless part of life, because it was an unimportant aspect of life and getting caught up in "quintessential human drama" (Guy with bike) which is like the catty people comment since that is part of the "quintessential human drama". Another consensus of an equal amount came to the conclusion that money was meaningless because quote "it screws things up" (Guy on Ipod).

A pattern I noticed is that what makes someone happy is a part of what they think is meaningful. It is something that is ingrained in modern life, the pursuit of happiness, as well as in our constitution (Declaration of Independence). Closeness and happiness is something that people find meaningful, whether it is because of our culture or something else, family and friends seem to be a part of that equation.

Most of the people we asked seemed interested in our project and gave thoughtful answers in response to our questions. I think the wiser answers in these interviews came from people of age, and they seemed to be affected by how they were brought up. The middle aged man, who was dressed in a business suit and seemed to come from a well off family, said that he thought education as well as family was important when asked about what was meaningful in life he said it was. When we asked people if we thought they were wise the people in the twenties often replied no, because a majority of people think that wisdom comes from age and experiences. But despite any differences of age or upbringing the way people thought about meaning were along the same lines.

"We determine meaning based on the function it serves in our lives" (Synder) could be the reason for why people feel the way they do about what they think is or isn’t meaningful. The People I had interviewed seemed to derive meaning in that way as well. The middle age old man obviously felt strongly about how much his family meant to him, so we can also see that it playing a large role in his life made him feel that it was something that was meaningful. His family made him happy and was a positive function his life and was how he determined that to be meaningful. The guy on the bike thought that human drama was not meaningful because it was function that detracted from his life was the grounds for why he thought it was not meaningful.

Reaction to 2008 Election

Yesterday, was a very historical moment when Barack Obama was named as president. Watching the votes being counted on tv was pretty exciting even though I expected Obama to win, because right now we're living in history in the making. I don't think that he'll be able to solve all the things he promised in the first year and he admits to that and its reasonable because this is a big problem, not just one that can be solved so simply. He knows and acknowledges that but I wonder if the rest of the americans will. Learning about the amount of people who didn't vote for him was pretty close in some cases and its a bit surprising. Not to knock anyone but he seems to be the more stable and secure canadate when compared to McCain. McCain's choice of selecting Palin being one example of this, seemed very random and not thought out at all. But I digress.
I stayed up and caught a bit of McCain's speech and felt that he seemed accepting of his defeat and that the "boos" of the McCain supporters were very immature and stupid. He seemed very human for the first time throughout the entire campaign. I guess people say that history should remember him for this speech rather than the attack ads and maybe that's true. It doesn't completely revert the image that I have of him, based on the campaign he has run, but it helps.