The meaning crisis deals “with the decentering of human life from its cosmic significance, a decline in our sense of purpose, and a sensation of having lost the soul that gave earlier human societies their adaptiveness and vitality. It seems we are left with a feeling of having lost our place in the world along with a sense of who we are and what we ought to do with ourselves.”1
The nihilism that Friedrich Nietzsche warned about has arrived. Society is fragmenting, authoritarian regimes are rising, and people feel lost and without purpose. Society is unraveling.
According to Viktor Frankl, “this striving to find a meaning in one’s life is the primary motivational force in man.”2 As Nietzsche said, “He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.”3 We need meaning in life—a worthwhile goal to strive for. We need to find a meaning worth living for.
So what is the cause of this meaning crisis? It stems from the fact that “traditional religious worldviews are no longer viable.”4 Our map of reality has been destroyed, and nothing has been offered to replace it.
A worldview is like a map: it tells us what reality is like and how to navigate it. It tells us what to strive for. It gives us direction and helps us understand what is worth pursuing. But with the collapse of religious traditions, our sense of direction is lost. We are lost.
Where do we go from here? That’s the question many are struggling with. Some have returned to the past and resurrected Stoicism. Others have turned to the East and embraced Buddhism. Some are trying to construct a new worldview based on science and secular ethics, often referred to as humanism.
I’ll be honest with you: none of these solutions are entirely satisfying. All of the old traditions need to be repaired, updated, or even reinvented. We live in a new age with new problems. There simply are no easy solutions.
Endnotes
1 John Vervaeke and Christopher Masterripietro, Awakening from the Meaning Crisis, Book One: Origins (Nashville: Story Grid, 2024), 1.
2 Viktor E. Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning (Boston: Beacon Press, 2006), 99.
3 As quoted in Frankl, Man’s Search, 104.
4 Vervaeke, Meaning Crisis, 395.
Dr. Jay Forrest is a spiritually independent philosopher and contemplative writer exploring rational spirituality, meditative practice, and wisdom traditions beyond organized religion, including Deism, Buddhism, Stoicism, and Daoism.