GETTING YOUR NEEDS MET
In our current Western and Westernised world, in so many ways we are quite far from our basic biological purpose to survive at least long enough to reproduce.
(Here’s a really great, well-written article about the scientific basis for sexual reproduction “The real reasons we have sex” by scientist Vivien Cumming.)
Some of us in fact are not able to, or do not desire to reproduce (and that is no one else’s business). That said, the centering of human life around reproduction is still both encoded in our DNA, and reinforced by society at large (as especially every female-presenting person knows). ‘Society’ doesn’t always do so well at actually supporting reproducing people.*
*We will save the rant about the USA’s lack of paid parental leave and family support for another time.
So if the purpose of a living creature is to survive long enough to reproduce, then what does one need to survive? One way of looking at human needs is Maslow’s (pronounced “maz” “low”) hierarchy of needs (Psychological Review, 1943). Although this model is not perfect, it describes that a person requires certain base physiological (body) needs to survive: food, water, shelter, sleep, oxygen, sex. Once those needs have been met, there is a hierarchy or stacking of different types of needs that a person is able to focus on to not just survive, but thrive. The ‘lower’ needs must be met (at least some of them, some of the time) in order to both allow consciousness for and motivation to address the so-called higher needs. The needs scale to the point of self-actualisation (knowing oneself, reaching one’s potential) and self-transcendence (seeing oneself as part of a larger whole). So one could argue that the purpose of life is self-actualisation and self-transcendence.
This is, of course, just a model, and people are complex, so this may not be applicable to all people, all of the time. However, each of these needs in the above pyramid based on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is an area which may be asking for greater nourishment in your life.