The Alternate Reality That Contains the Meaning of Life

Life in this world

The question at the heart of every conversation I have about the afterlife is the meaning of life. What is the meaning of life? What’s life for? It stands to reason that discussions of the afterlife track with discussions of the meaning of life, I think, because people I talk to are dissatisfied with or completely lacking answers to the meaning of life in this world, so they wonder, perhaps, if the answer lies in an alternate reality, in this case, the afterlife.

It’s like searching the living room for your keys. After looking under the couch and turning over all the cushions, eventually, you have to admit your keys aren’t in the living room and perhaps it’s time to look in the kitchen.

If no satisfactory answer to the meaning of life exists in this world. Maybe one exists in the next.

Life in the next world

Nietzsche referred to this idea as the “True World Theory.” According to Nietzsche, a true world is an alternate reality where values and moral purity originate and where the secrets of life are contained. A true world, in his theory, is, in fact, a place; a place accessible via death, like heaven.

When my dad had a near death experience, he described entering a world where truth lived. Everything from his life on Earth came flooding back.

“Everything I’d ever done in my life, or ever said, I automatically became known of it,” He said in a 1981 interview.

So called, “life reviews” are a common feature of near death experiences, as is an encounter with a being of higher knowledge or truth, a figure of existential authority who knows the life of the experiencer and issues guidance to them. My dad too met this higher being and was told by it that he must return to Earth, that he had a purpose yet to be fulfilled.

What meaning means

Purpose, Nietzsche said, ticks two boxes in the human mind. One, defuses nihilism. Having a purpose helps you get up each morning and face the world, knowing your life is meaningful. The other, strokes the ego. You are the center of your universe and are, therefore, important.

I spend a lot of time wondering which of these my dad favored. I’m inclined to think it’s the latter, but that could just be good, old-fashioned bitterness. The human mind, I might speculate, is resilient when faced with extinction. The will to live is so strong it will do or say anything to survive.