Ch 11 “I hope that you will have a vision of life that will sustain you in the moments, on the pavement. There will likely be a day when the world stops and your heart breaks and you will need a vision of a life worth living that will survive the storm. Surely your vision will be deepened, transformed, sharpened by the days on the pavement. But I hope you vision has an … anchor that will hold you.”

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With retirement comes more free time and possibly an opportunity to develop a new hobby or passion. And as we previously mentioned, finding a passion is one way to develop meaning. Vallerand (2012) provides an excellent summary of the role that motivation plays in developing passion and how passion leads to a meaningful life. Veissier, I.; Jensen, K.K.; Botreau, R.; Sandøe, P. Highlighting ethical decisions underlying the scoring of animal welfare in the Welfare Quality scheme. Anim. Welfare 2011, 20, 89–101. [ Google Scholar]

Hemsworth, P.H.; Mellor, D.J.; Cronin, G.; Tilbrook, A. Scientific assessment of animal welfare. N. Z. Vet. J. 2015, 63, 24–30. [ Google Scholar] [ CrossRef] [ PubMed] If you are reading this article, then living a meaningful life must be of interest to you. You might be wondering what we mean by ‘meaningful,’ and whether there are any benefits to striving toward such a way of living. Are there any practical suggestions for how to achieve a meaningful life? The title is based on a class that has been taught for years at Yale University, asking the question what makes a good life or what makes life matter? Is it simply being healthy, happy and successful as the world views? It looks at everything from different world religions to beliefs held by thinkers like Thomas Jefferson and others to stories of visiting professors to the course. Whether it’s caring for the planet, the mental health of future generations, or something entirely your own, passion for making a difference might give you the spark you’re looking for. The chance to lift others up What is love? In pop culture, love is often depicted as a willingness to sacrifice, but ancient philosophers took a different viewFraser, D.; Weary, D.M.; Pajor, E.A.; Milligan, B.N. A scientific conception of animal welfare that reflects ethical concerns. Anim. Welfare 1997, 6, 187–205. [ Google Scholar] Garner, J.P. The significance of meaning: Why do over 90% of behavioral neuroscience results fail to translate to humans, and what can we do to fix it? ILAR J. 2014, 55, 438–456. [ Google Scholar] [ CrossRef] [ PubMed]

My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style. Caycho-Rodríguez T, et al. (2021). Measurement of the will to live in older adults: Transcultural adaptation, validity and reliability of the Will-to-Live Scale. Although these answers aren’t necessarily trivial, they strike me as very unsatisfying answers to the question “What makes life wort living?” What about family, friends, work, etc. makes life worth living? Just having them?Beausoleil, N.J.; Mellor, D.J. Complementary roles for systematic analytical evaluation and qualitative whole animal profiling in welfare assessment for Three Rs applications. ALTEX Proc. 2012, 1, 455–460. [ Google Scholar] How can we go about finding our meaning? First, there is no single panacea to the sense of living without meaning. Finding meaning is ultimately a personal journey. What brings me meaning might not bring you meaning. However, this doesn’t mean that the techniques used to find meaning won’t be helpful. Viktor Frankl (1959, p. 99) supported the notion that finding meaning is a unique journey when he wrote in Man’s Search for Meaning: Although social connections are important, not all social relationships are equal. Make sure to focus on relationships that make you feel like you ‘belong’ (Lambert et al., 2013), where you feel like you fit in with the members of that group, and where there is group identification.