Skip to content
quotesby

About this quote

What does it mean?
Our actions lack a central purpose or meaning.
In plain terms
There's nothing at the center of what we do.
What can you take from it?
Search for purpose rather than drifting.

Where it applies

  • career work
  • creative projects
  • daily routines

Putting it to work

  • set meaningful goals
  • align tasks with values

Questions to consider

  • What gives your work meaning?
  • Can purpose be created rather than found?

Another view

Some people find meaning in process itself, not a central point.

More from Douglas Coupland

  1. Nobody believes the identites we've made for ourselves. I feel like everybody in the world is fake now - as though people had true cores once, but hucked them …

    Permalink to quote #50
  2. Her friends have become who they've become by default. Their dreams are forgotten, or were never formulated to begin with.

    Permalink to quote #52
  3. At twenty you know you're not going to be a rock star... by twenty-five you know you're not going to be a dentist or a professional... by thirty, a darkness st…

    Permalink to quote #49

Related quotes

  1. Why has my life turned out to be so worthless?

    Orson Scott CardOrson Scott Card quote #428
  2. I cannot think we are useless or Usen would not have created us. He created all tribes of men and certainly had a righteous purpose in creating each.

    GeronimoGeronimo quote #2
  3. It is only when we realize that life is taking us nowhere that it begins to have meaning.

    P. D. OuspenskyP. D. Ouspensky quote #3