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For the majority of the world’s population, God is the purpose of their existence. According to the 13th-century Italian scholar Thomas Aquinas, the ultimate goal of human existence is to attain a supernatural union with God, which is only fully realised in the afterlife. Earthly happiness is to be found by following a virtuous path of prudence, courage, self-restraint, fairness, and honesty, coupled with faith in God. Other religions believe a similar message. Virtuous living, then, becomes a meal ticket to eternal salvation, but only if you believe. Faith brings happiness. Happiness leads to God. 

If this premise were true, then all those who had faith must surely be happy, and they clearly aren’t. Just look at the war in Gaza. People of faith are justifying the mass slaughter of innocent people. There are plenty of other examples of religious people committing heinous acts. That is not happiness by anyone’s definition. Faith might bring happiness for some, but it doesn’t work on every level, at all times, for all people. Happiness is complicated, it seems.

Deists like me do not believe God intervenes in human daily affairs. We believe that He has created a universe according to scientific, natural laws, in which value and goodness are inherent ingredients, and in which we all have free will. I believe the more we practice virtuous living, the greater chance we have of being happy. Not unlike Aquinas then, except in the Deist world, there is no pre-condition to worship Him. This is not to abandon God, but rather to say that virtuous living will ultimately lead to the same goal.

Aquinas’s message was not original, however, even when he wrote it, eight hundred years ago. Chinese, Hindu, Greek, and Islamic scholars had said the same thing, long before he did. Divine happiness was the ultimate goal in life, and while it was to be found in living virtuously, this didn’t make it any easier to find. Their message was clear: finding this divine essence was a lifelong struggle that required absolute commitment. 

What then, do the great philosophers say about finding purpose in life? A school of thought called Empiricism, led by 17th-century philosophers such as Francis Bacon, John Locke, and David Hume, believed we are born as a blank slate (tabula rasa) and that we develop purpose through thoughts and experiences as we grow. Rationalists, led by Descartes, Leibniz, Spinoza, argued against this and said no, knowledge is innate to us. We are born with intellectual faculties that shape our ability to grasp truths, ethics, logic, and purpose. This became the nature versus nurture debate we still have today. Of course, both are right. While we are born with natural genetic predispositions, we really do need good nurturing to help us grow. We aren’t born with a clear purpose then, we must find it ourselves, and this is what later 19th and 20th-century philosophers from the Existentialist group said. Existentialists such as Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Simone de Beauvoir, all taught that there is no divine purpose to life – we must create it ourselves. They said we do this through our actions, through free choice, through our values, and by leading an authentic life. To them, we do not possess any inherent identity or value; it is left to the individual to create it. 

There is a clear and distinct separation between faith and purpose in their teachings. Religion doesn’t factor into them much. Purpose is found in either innate knowledge, life experience, or free will. The downside of doing this I think, is that it takes away something of great value and replaces it with something tenuous and intangible. Like it or loathe it, organised religion provides great wisdom and instruction. It offers a tremendous focus and structure for purpose in life. 

Philosophical free will is all very well and good, for those who have the good fortune and the intellect, to be able to find it. Others are born in adversity, and have a greater struggle just to survive, let alone find spiritual or intellectual happiness. That said, purpose isn’t dependent on good nurturing or innate knowledge, but they sure do help. It’s easier to find happiness if you come from loving parents who instil confidence, ethics, and morals in you, and who give you a great start in life. Much harder if your mum beat you and your dad was always drunk. Even harder if you were born in a war zone, extreme poverty, or with genetic predispositions towards mental or physical health conditions. 

This leads me to one of life’s profound lessons: it doesn’t matter who you are or where you come from, happiness is found from within. You may think that the ability to read complex, philosophical, spiritual texts would give you greater truth and insight – but they don’t. Intelligent people aren’t any happier than unintelligent ones. You may think that being rich would make you happy. It doesn’t. Rich people aren’t any happier than poor ones. You may think religion makes people happy. It doesn’t. Religious people face the same struggles as everyone else. The beautiful truth of life is that we are born with the propensity for happiness in abundance and we either lose it or it is taken away from us. Tiny children have an incredible, wonderful truth to them in their simple, honest, playful nature. In a similar way, old age and adversity can sometimes bring back that same mental state. My mother had Alzheimer’s and she used to have periods where she reverted back to a blissful, childlike state of mind. Of course, this tragic illness isn’t always like that, but it often is.

Evolution gave human beings higher cognitive processing powers. Through our enhanced cerebral cortex, we developed higher mental functions for language, problem-solving, memory, and intelligence. This has given us the most amazing, incredible gifts, but it also loaded us with cognitive complexity. What philosophers call free will, is food for anxiety to our overloaded brains. The reason small children are more likely to be blissfully happy is because they haven’t developed the neurological circuits that enable higher-level thought. This applies to unfortunate people like my mother, who sadly lost her higher processing powers and sadly reverted to basic, emotional states. 

Prayer, meditation, and intense focus are the art of controlling these higher-level processing powers. It tames the beast, so to speak. Being able to silence the inner cerebral rage leads us closer to the Divine Essence espoused in religious texts over the millennia. Religion doesn’t have exclusive rights to that essence however; it simply provides a structure so that people en masse can access it. 

Purpose is ours to find then. We have free will, we are born with gifts, we are raised with others, religion, and philosophy can lead us to the wisdom of the ages, but ultimately, purpose and happiness are found in the same places time and time again. It’s found in how we love, in who we love, in our connections to others, in how benevolent we are, in how patient and kind we are, in how we overcome our struggles to find joy and rejoice in the wonderful, awesome world around us. Happiness isn’t found in being dominant, aggressive, violent, greedy or selfish. These things inevitably lead to greater turmoil.

So, explore the world around you, do something new and unexpected, dance, sing, write, make art, pray or get together with friends and loved ones to release the inner child within you. The child you lost along the way. This is where you will find your purpose. This is how you will learn to be happy. Purpose isn’t something we read in obscure, abstract texts; in fact, we don’t have to travel very far to find it at all. It has been right there in our hearts all along; we just weren’t looking in the right places.