Jen's Journal

There are three questions my partner has been asking three philosophical questions recently:

• What do you want to be written on your gravestone?
• What separates us from animals?
• What is the meaning of life?

Before I give my answers, take a moment to think about your answers to this. 

For the first one, I don’t want to be buried. I don’t know if I want my loved ones to remember just one quote from me. I want them to remember me in their way, in their own words. I think that’s why I still don’t have an answer to this, even though he asked me months ago. 

To answer the second question, I should answer the third one first. If you’re able to think about the concept of meaning and then apply it to life, you’re already different than any animal. 

On the other hand, not everyone has the luxury of thinking about such concepts. People going through a famine, or war, or trafficking. If they haven’t eaten all day and all they can think about is food, they’ve been stripped of basic human rights that separate us from animals. In a lot of ways, they’ve been stripped of their humanity. 

I go back and forth with this question because to answer it I have to ask, what makes us human? If we can agree on what that is, then I don’t think I can answer a question like “what is the meaning of life” if every human on the planet can’t answer it.