Grosjean’s case reminds me
of a friend who is a devoted Christian minister, who presumably believes that
his life is meaningful by virtue of his identity as a Christian minister, or,
in his own words, as God’s servant. Let us imagine that in the last few years
of his life he became skeptical about his religious beliefs and finally gave
them up (this is, I have to say, extremely unlikely to happen). Suppose there
were no other identities he identified himself with; should he then believe
that his life was meaningless? It depends. On the one hand, he had to say that
since there is no God, no one can be God’s servant. On the other hand, there
might be other elements in his identity as a Christian minister that could
contribute to the meaningfulness of his life. For example, he might have, in his
capacity as a minister, helped a lot of people deal with their personal
problems. If he himself valued this element of his identity as a minister, and
other people valued it too, then his life could still be meaningful by virtue
of his identity as a Christian minister.
It is risky to focus on
one single identity in such a way that the meaningfulness of your life depends solely
on it. If you have only one identity that you think makes your life meaningful,
and if something goes wrong with respect to that identity, such as if you
actually have a serious misunderstanding of the nature of that identity, or if
you suddenly do not value it any more, your life may turn out to be
meaningless. Grosjean’s is a case in point. If all goes well, then one identity
will suffice; but things do not always go well. Although not all our identities
are chosen by us, some are. It is thus wise, as far as the meaningfulness of
our lives is concerned, to develop what psychologist Daniel Nettle calls
‘self-complexity’. As Nettle explains, “if I am just an academic, and I have an
academic setback, then my whole self seems less efficacious and worthwhile.
However, if I have many other facets to myself, then the effect of the setback
on my identity is much less severe” (Happiness:
The Science Behind Your Smile, p.156). He speaks in the context of discussing
happiness, but it is clear that the same point applies to meaningfulness.
The above point about
self-complexity may give us some ideas about how to live a meaningful life. This
may also be true of the final point I would like to make, which is that a
meaningful life consists in living it rather than in thinking about how to live
it. Part of Grosjean’s problem might be that he was too much aware of the
problem of meaningfulness and tried too hard to make his life meaningful. There
is such a thing as thinking too much and too often about the problem about meaningfulness.
This may be what Wittgenstein means when he writes:
The way to solve the
problem you see in life is to live in a way that will make what is problematic
disappear. … a man who lives rightly won’t experience the problem as sorrow, so
for him it will not be a problem, but a joy rather; in other words for him it
will be a bright halo round his life, not a dubious background. (Culture
and Value, p.27)