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Gary Stogsdill is an Emeritus Faculty at Prescott College in Arizona.

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Meaning in Life

John Vervaeke and the Meaning Crisis

Gary Stogsdill

Humans are meaning-seeking creatures; we need to feel that our lives matter, that we have significance beyond the mundane concerns of survival. We should have named ourselves Homo significatio instead of the questionable Homo sapiens [1]. Nietzsche is famous for saying, “He who has a why to live can bear almost any how” (in Twilight of the Idols). A fullness of meaning allowed a young Jewish psychiatrist in the 1940s to lose literally everything and endure years of unimaginable horrors at Auschwitz [2]. An absence of sufficient meaning motivated a young prince in Ancient India who had everything anyone could want to renounce that everything and endure years of ascetic suffering in search of deeper meaning.

This essay is about meaning in life, as distinguished from pondering the big philosophical question, What is the meaning of life? [3], and also as distinguished from the everyday meaning that arises by simply showing interest in literally anything or anyone [4]. For example, virtually all of us find meaning in certain relationships, work well done, and creative endeavors. But meaning in life is something different; it refers to a sense of belonging here just by virtue of being alive. It's an existential condition that is automatic in other animals, but that has become an issue for some humans over the last few thousand years, which is why we create religions, spiritual paths, and philosophical movements like stoicism and existentialism.

Dr. John Vervaeke

Perhaps no one has done more in recent years to address meaning in life than Dr. John Vervaeke, a professor of cognitive science, psychology, and Buddhist psychology at Toronto University. Dr. Vervaeke is probably best known for his masterful 50-part YouTube series Awakening from the Meaning Crisis, the first episode of which has received more than 750,000 views. His overall work is a deep dive into cognitive science, psychology, religion both Western and Eastern, and philosophy both Western and Eastern, all focused on what Vervaeke calls “the meaning crisis.” The ambitious scope of his project is revealed by how he referred to it for many years, “a religion that's not a religion” [5], and by the striking admission that he wants to “steal the culture” in the same way that early Christianity stole the culture of the Roman Empire (The Sacred with Elizabeth Oldfield, 62) [6].

But the obvious question needs to be asked: Do we really have a meaning crisis that requires awakening from? In the past few years when Vervaeke discusses the meaning crisis, he has tended to mention the following points:

1. People are leaving religions, especially in Western Christian countries.
2. The science-based worldview of materialism is replacing religious and mythological worldviews.
3. People are increasingly lonely and have fewer friends.
4. We are in the midst of a mental health crisis.
5. A 2019 survey in the UK shows that 80% of UK residents feel their lives are meaningless.

Regarding the first point, leaving the religion you were raised in might be a positive step toward increasing your meaning in life. Surely the main reason people leave a religion is because it no longer makes sense and therefore no longer provides sufficient meaning. Also, many people consider themselves to be spiritual but not religious, and spirituality is all about finding existential meaning in life. In fairness to Vervaeke, he sees his work as helping those very people who are cultivating deeper meaning through spirituality, but there seems to be an underlying assumption that those who practice their own chosen form of spirituality cannot achieve the level of meaning available to those who are still embedded within a traditional religion. I question that implicit assumption.

For the second point, science itself is completely neutral regarding existential meaning in life. Natural science does not and cannot study spiritual matters; it only studies the material world. Yes, many scientists and others who love science end up with a materialistic worldview that denies any inherent meaning in life, but this is not the fault of science. And no one is obligated to adopt a materialistic worldview just because others have chosen to limit their understanding of reality by putting on nihilistic glasses. Science and spirituality can coexist peacefully, and I believe a large number of people have chosen to live this way. [7]

The third point seems to me a separate issue from the question of existential meaning in life. Obviously, being connected to others can be meaningful, but loneliness has many causes including that most societies no longer support extended families and that social media, remote jobs, and endless virtual entertainment tend to remove us from actual human contact. I'm not sure that providing an existential framework for meaning in life can replace our basic human need for companionship and human interaction, which is why I previously labeled relationships as “everyday meaning” and a separate category from meaning in life.

The fourth point also seems to me at least partly a separate issue from the question of existential meaning in life. Yes, of course, feeling disconnected from life itself can lead to anxiety, depression, and existential despair. But so many other factors, most of them societal and some of them physiological, contribute to poor mental health that it seems like a reach to blame our “mental health crisis” (if we do have one) on a different crisis of insufficient meaning in life. Every religion, spiritual path, and life philosophy out there provides an existential framework for meaning in life; are we to believe that the billions of adherents to these systems of meaning are immune to mental unwellness because they have solved their own meaning crisis?

The last point is an astonishing statistic, and live audiences gasp when they hear it, as you can see two minutes into this lecture: Solving the Meaning Crisis. However, Vervaeke does not mention an author for this 2019 survey, and my search for it yielded disturbing information. The so-called survey was conducted by a probiotics manufacturer, Yakult, using “a limited population sample… to promote product sales” (Dave Snowden) by associating their product with meaning in life. Yakult's PR Manager all but tells us this herself in the press release: "[Our] research proves how many Brits are searching for their true objectives in life… .We want to introduce the nation to Ikigai, a Japanese self-development concept, which is a framework for bringing satisfaction, happiness and meaning to your life” (The Sun). Yakult's “research” was not published by a single reputable journal or website, but rather in The Sun, a British tabloid with a long history of printing false information and being sued for it (Wikipedia). In other words, the astonishing statistic used by Vervaeke to promote his vision of a meaning crisis is completely without merit.

Interestingly, during my search for Vervaeke's survey, I found credible statistical data from the UK government showing that UK residents in 2019 ranked their life satisfaction at 7.7 out of 10 (Well-Being of People in the UK). For those still inclined to believe that 80% of any population could feel that their lives are meaningless, how would we reconcile this statistic with the same population ranking their life satisfaction at nearly 80%? Can people be well satisfied with their lives while at the same time deriving no meaning whatsoever from relationships, work, hobbies, nature, an intellectual life, a spiritual life, or anything else including even a virtual life? This makes no sense at all and suggests that the study Vervaeke refers to is not just wrong, but so wrong as to be opposite of what is true.

For all of the above reasons, I don't believe it's accurate to claim that we have a meaning crisis. Rather, what we have, and have had since at least the time of Buddha, is that some people feel a longing for deeper existential meaning in their lives beyond the readily available everyday meaning inherent in relationships, work, creative engagement, etc. I was one of them in my late teens and early twenties. In my experience these people end up finding exactly what they need through whatever belief system and/or practices that can nourish this longing [8]. But a lot of us, perhaps most of us, have no need for anything deeper in order to live good, productive lives that are full of meaning. For example, I was recently discussing the topic of meaning in life with my 27-year-old son [9], and after several minutes he said, “You know, I just feel like my life is inherently meaningful whether or not there's any deeper meaning to anything.” Or, as Vervaeke's own friend Jonathan Pageau put it: “Meaning is actually inevitable; you cannot escape it” (What Atheists Get Wrong).

Why, then, would Vervaeke be so certain of a meaning crisis that he devotes his life's work to helping others awaken from it? And why is it that this brilliant and careful cognitive scientist who specializes in avoiding self-deception would readily accept the outrageous claim that 80% of UK residents feel their lives are meaningless, without bothering to check out the accuracy of that statistic? There has to be something that would predispose Vervaeke to believe that most of us are living without real meaning in our lives.

Here's where my last couple of essays for Integral World might be pertinent. In the first of these essays, I highlighted research from Dr. Willoughby Britton and others showing that a dissociative condition of the mind known as derealization can be an adverse effect of meditation. In this condition, the meditator feels as though they have awakened to something more real than ordinary reality, which in comparison seems dreamlike, less real, or even unreal. In that first essay, I suggested from my own experience that most, perhaps all, of those with a serious enough and long enough meditation practice will enter derealization. In the second essay, I argued that the attainment of enlightenment in the yoga spiritual tradition, and probably in all spiritual traditions, is actually a more or less permanent acquisition of that dissociative condition of derealization.

Vervaeke has been a serious meditator for decades, refers to himself as a meditation teacher, and considers himself to be “part of the mindfulness revolution” (Solving the Meaning Crisis, 12). Whenever Vervaeke discusses the “ecology of practices” necessary to awaken from the meaning crisis, he touts meditation as a foundational practice to bring us in touch with the “really real.” He also frequently discusses the term enlightenment, suggests that possessing this state of mind is what anchors us in the “really real,” and describes his work as an attempt to “reverse engineer enlightenment” (episode 37: Reverse Engineering Enlightenment). He would have to feel that he has attained fluency with enlightenment in order to describe his work this way. In my experience of living in the state of meditation-induced derealization for more than two decades, it feels unfathomable that ordinary people who are not meditating and doing other spiritual practices could possibly experience the level of meaning that you experience, because they simply cannot be in touch with that which is really real like you are.

A personal story comes to mind. For 19 years I was closely associated with a community of serious meditators and lived in that community for two periods during this time. When I decided to leave the community the first time [10], two of the leaders sat me down and with looks of horror on their faces asked if I realized what I was doing, which according to them was “going back out into the world where everyone was living in delusion.” (Delusion was the term used within this spiritual path to suggest that ordinary reality is not really real.) For a number of years after this move, I was genuinely astonished to see normal, non-meditating people living good, meaningful lives. Such is the power of derealization.

I don't mean to suggest that Vervaeke may be living in a state of derealization comparable to the atrocious gurus discussed in my recent essay on enlightenment. He leads a balanced, scholarly life that would tend to even out the extremes of derealization. What I do mean to suggest is that it's completely consistent with some level of meditation-induced derealization to feel that you have access to a reality that's more real than ordinary reality, and therefore to feel that most other people cannot possibly be living a deeply meaningful life. I don't think it's an accident that Vervaeke originally called his work “a religion that's not a religion.” Probably every prophet of every religion has felt the same way as Vervaeke about a “meaning crisis” and about being in touch with a more real reality than ordinary people can experience.

I also don't mean to suggest that Vervaeke's work is not insightful and valuable. I believe it is; the effort to understand and enhance meaning in life can definitely benefit the rest of us. I have only attempted with this essay to offer a perspective that might help explain Vervaeke's zeal to want to create “a religion that's not a religion” and to “steal the culture.” My motive for this is because it would be easy for some of us to feel like we are missing a vital secret in our lives, like we are deficient, when we listen to Vervaeke's compelling presentations on awakening from the meaning crisis [11]. If my perspective of meditation → derealization = enlightenment is accurate, then we are not missing any secret at all and can continue to live our lives with the tools of meaning that are readily available to all of us.

NOTES

[1] It's questionable because sapiens, of course, means wise, and we seldom find a majority of humans behaving wisely, as painfully illustrated by the recent US election of Trump.

[2] This would be Viktor Frankl, author of Man's Search for Meaning.

[3] There's definitely overlap between the two, primarily in the fact that those who feel like they have found an answer for the meaning of life will tend to automatically enjoy meaning in life.

[4] There's also overlap between these two, for example, those who find meaning in life will tend to automatically feel more everyday meaning.

[5] More recently, Vervaeke has softened this reference to “a philosophical silk road.”

[6] In other podcast appearances, Vervaeke has made it clear that he doesn't believe his movement is about him personally, that he views his work as being in service to something else. But it's also clear that he does want to steal the culture.

[7] Vervaeke, of course, is aware of all this regarding science and does not blame science itself for the materialistic worldview that he sees contributing to the meaning crisis.

[8] I believe this longing for existential meaning in life is why cults can gain such a fervent following even when completely untethered to common sense.

[9] This story may seem like I was promoting some form of deeper meaning to my son. Not at all; I've always been careful to allow my son to form his own relationship with life and the big questions thereof. He brought up the topic while we were discussing Thomas Nagel's book What Does It All Mean?

[10] At this time I was not leaving that spiritual path or my connection to that community. I left the physical community because of an offer I couldn't refuse to go live as caretaker of a 200-acre ranch deep in the mountains of southeastern Arizona.

[11] I've noticed that virtually all spiritual teachings are based on the alluring assumption that we are missing something, or have lost something, which we really need in order to be okay. I question that assumption.