Why do we search for meaning?

The wisdom that one should know: to know and to observe the secret of his Master, know himself, know who he is, how he was created, where he comes from and where he is going, how the body is corrected, and how he will be judged by the King of all.

To know and to observe the secret of the soul. What is this soul within him? Where does it come from, and why does it come into this body, which is a foul drop that is here today, and in the grave tomorrow? To know the world one is in, and for what will the world be corrected. Afterward, one should observe the sublime secrets of the upper world, to know one’s Master. And one observes all that from within the secrets of the Torah. 

Zohar for All, Zohar Hadash, Song of Songs, “The Wisdom One Must Know, Items 482-483.

Everything that moves in a person begins from desire. A person eats because there is a desire for food, rests because there is a desire for comfort, studies because there is a desire to know, works because there is a desire for security, and seeks connection because there is a desire to be filled through others. Even when a person seems to act against desire, there is still some desire operating there: a desire to avoid pain, to reach a greater goal, to be respected, to understand, to belong, or to find meaning.

Before continuing, several simple axioms should be clarified that we find in the wisdom of Kabbalah. They are not yet spiritual terms, but they help explain the basic movement of desire, and will be used throughout the article:

1. Desire is set in motion by pleasure and suffering. Pleasure attracts a person, and suffering repels a person.
2. A person desires something because one senses, or deduces, that it will bring more pleasure than suffering.
3. When a person expects pleasure from something, one gives importance to it. The more important something becomes, the more a person desires it.
4. The more a person desires something and does not have it, the more the lack is felt. A felt lack is equivalent to suffering, whether small or great.
5. The greater the lack before reception, the greater the pleasure when the desired thing is received.
6. Therefore, pleasure depends on lack. The greater the lack, the greater the pleasure; the smaller the lack, the smaller the pleasure.
7. Yet when pleasure is received, the lack becomes smaller. Thus, the more one receives pleasure, the less the same pleasure gives satisfaction.

For this reason, desire can be seen as the basic material of human life. It is not difficult to observe this. If there were no lack, there would be no movement. If nothing were missing, no question would arise, no effort would be made, and no development would be needed. A lack awakens a movement toward fulfillment, and this movement forms the entire structure of a person’s life.

The wisdom of Kabbalah begins from this same point, but follows it to its root. It explains that the created being is a desire to receive pleasure. This means that desire is not only one quality within a person, alongside thought, feeling, memory, etc. Desire is the place or the reason out of which all of these are felt. Whatever a person calls life appears inside the desire, according to what the desire is filled with or lacks, and further, what it aspires to and what it expects to receive.

Hence, it is considered that the above-mentioned will to receive is the whole substance of creation from beginning to end. Thus, all the created beings, all their innumerable instances and conducts that have appeared and will appear, are but measures and various values of the will to receive. All that exists in those created beings, that is, all that is received in the will to receive imprinted in them, extends from His self, existence from existence. It is not at all a new creation, existence from absence, since it is not new at all. Rather, it extends from His Endlessness existence from existence.

Baal HaSulam, Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah

It is to the point that If there were no desire at all, there would be no reality to perceive. And even before such a complete absence of desire, the same principle can be seen gradually: when the desire is small, reality is felt in a narrow and limited way; when the desire grows, more things begin to awaken attention, calculation – hope, fear, and meaning (cf. axioms 2 and 3: what the desire expects to bring pleasure receives importance, and what receives importance begins to occupy the person’s perception.)

A filled desire can make reality appear alive and meaningful, because many things seem connected to pleasure; and as said previously, this pleasure sets a person in motion; they start being dynamic and being directed towards all sorts of places. An empty desire, especially when it has grown and cannot find fulfillment, can make the same reality appear empty, because the person no longer senses what can truly fill it; and there is no longer any movement in which the person would feel any worth. Thus, the state of one’s desire becomes the most important basis for fulfillment and perception.

We cannot attain any reality as it is in itself. Rather, we attain everything only according to our sensations. And reality, as it is in itself, is of no interest to us at all. Hence, we do not attain the Torah as it is in itself; we attain only our sensations. Thus, all of our impressions follow only our sensations.

Baal HaSulam, Shamati, Article No. 66, "Concerning the Giving of the Torah – 1"

It follows that the development of a person is also the development of desire. At first, desire appears in simple forms: rest, food, family, and the immediate needs without which life cannot continue. Later, it expands toward society, honor, and control; then, toward knowledge; and finally, meaning.

But one should note that these desires are not accidental additions to life. They show how the will to receive grows and demands a greater and more refined fulfillment. What once satisfied the desire no longer satisfies it in the same way, because the desire itself has changed (cf. axioms 5 and 6: pleasure is measured according to the lack that precedes it, and when the lack becomes greater, the same fulfillment is no longer felt as the same pleasure.) A child can be filled by simple pleasures, because the lack is still simple; that is, life is complete with these pleasures alone. But eventually, although these same things fill the desire, they no longer bring the same amount of pleasure, as said in axiom 7: thus, the desire grows, and needs more pleasure in order to be filled; the person needs recognition, independence, and so on, which are already much more complex than the desire for food, for instance.

And although it is evident that smaller or greater lacks can occur throughout one’s life, and that these can be filled more or less easily, the point of transition between these stages in life is generally much harsher. A person has learned their whole life that these particular fillings were bringing satisfaction, and yet, they no longer bring any. Nothing of which a person has in its perception of reality is valuable or meaningful, because the entire reality was always measured according to that desire. Thus, when the desire grows beyond its previous fulfillments, the person does not only lack some particular pleasure; one begins to lose the inner measure by which life itself appeared meaningful. What once moved the person no longer moves them, and there is no purpose anymore for one’s days, and the person begins to feel a lack that cannot yet be named.

When one has nothing with which to nourish his body, meaning when he does not feel pleasure, he immediately begins to think about life’s purpose. [...] This is regarded as a person raising his head from the currents of life, where all the creatures are, and they have no time to think about what they are. Rather, they go with the flow where the water goes. And there is no one who can see the end, meaning where the flow of life is leading. Only he, because the lack of pleasure causes him to raise his head up in order to look at life’s purpose.

Rabash. Article 7 (1987) The Miracle Of Hanukkah

According to axiom 3, this also means that what once had importance loses its importance, because the desire no longer expects pleasure from it. And in this desire that has grown and which is empty in between these periods of transition, one can find new ways to be satisfied. Therefore, one goes from food and family to honor and money, onto knowledge, and so on. And the greater the desire was before having to transition out of emptiness, and the harsher the transition is. And a person evolves and develops in life only though this way: there’s a desire to fill with pleasure, the desire grows, the pleasure is no longer enough, and needs to be filled with something greater. In other words, as we’ve formulated it previously, and through a more general point of view: first, life is complete and fulfilling, because everything brings pleasure within the desire; then, each same filling no longer brings the same amount of pleasure, because the desire is greater, which means its emptier; that is, life feels less significant because less things bring pleasure. This is the repeated action of axioms 6 and 7: pleasure depends on lack, yet reception reduces the lack, and therefore the same fulfillment gradually loses its power to satisfy.

Eventually, however, the desire may reach a state in which the familiar transitions no longer work in the same way. Previously, when one form of fulfillment lost its power, another could appear as greater. But when the desire has developed through many such forms, it begins to feel that the problem is not only the absence of a particular filling. The person may still recognize many possible pleasures, achievements, or experiences, and yet none of them appears capable of answering the lack that has awakened. Here the difficulty is no longer only that the person lacks some known pleasure; rather, according to axiom 2, the desire can no longer deduce clearly what will bring more pleasure than suffering. And even if a person has all of these pleasures, this, too, is no longer satisfactory. And what will bring an end to this suffering?

Indeed, if we set our hearts to answer but one very famous question, I am certain that all these questions and doubts will vanish from the horizon, and you will look unto their place to find them gone, meaning this indignant question that the whole world asks, namely, “What is the meaning of my life?” In other words, these numbered years of our life that cost us so heavily, and the numerous pains and torments that we suffer for them, to complete them to the fullest, who is it who enjoys them? Or even more precisely, whom do I delight?

Baal HaSulam, Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot

As long as the desire knows what can fill it, the person searches for that fulfillment. When food is lacking, one seeks food; when honor is lacking, one seeks honor; and so on. But when the lack remains even after many possible fulfillments have been tasted, the question changes its form. It is no longer only, “What can give me pleasure?” but “What is the purpose of all these pleasures if none of them gives lasting fulfillment?” In this way, the desire begins to ask about itself: “why is it that pleasure is only attained through suffering? And not only that, but why is it that pleasure ends up emptying itself? And why is it that, ultimately, amongst everything that happens, life is filled with more suffering than it is with pleasure? What is the cause of all of this, what is all of this for, and what am I expected to do? Nothing of what I experienced in my life brings any joy anymore.”

How hard-hearted are people, for they do not watch over the words of that world at all. The evil in the heart, which clings to all organs of the body, does that to them. “There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, and it is heavy upon men.” This evil is the force of the evil in the heart that wishes to dominate the worldly matters and does not watch over the matters of that world at all.

Zohar for All, BeHaalotcha [When You Mount the Candles], "God Has Not Empowered Him to Eat From Them", Item 140

And there is no argument that seems to stuff these questions. In Kabbalah, this is the opportunity for the development of a new stage, because from now on, as long as a person nurtures this point which Kabbalah calls “the point in the heart”, then a person advances towards its root, which they search through these questions.

It is called a point because, in the beginning, it is not yet a complete vessel, but rather only the first awakening of a desire directed toward the root of life itself. To nurture this point means to give importance to this question instead of covering it with temporary answers. From here, the wisdom of Kabbalah begins to become practical, because for now, the point in the heart only shows that the desire has reached a state where its root must be discovered. Thus, the next matter is the correction of desire: how the will to receive, which feels life through lack and fulfillment, can acquire a new form through which the purpose of creation becomes attainable.

All the conducts of creation, in its every corner, inlet, and outlet, are completely prearranged for the purpose of nurturing the human species from within it, to improve its qualities until it can sense the Creator as one feels one’s friend. These ascensions are like rungs of a ladder, arranged degree by degree until it is completed and achieves its purpose.

Baal HaSulam, "The Teaching of the Kabbalah and Its Essence"