I was watching a cat. I wondered. Does she ever stop, sit, and contemplate, what is the purpose of her life?
I don’t think she does. I think she works on very simple processes. She has a stomach. It grumbles. When it does, she feels uncomfortable. She doesn’t like that feeling.
She likes me because she sees me as a provider of food. She has discovered that some things smell nice, and when she puts those things in her mouth and chews on them and swallows them, it makes the uncomfortable feeling go away.
All she wants to do is not have that uncomfortable feeling. She spends her day eating, drinking water, and sleeping.
Isn’t that what we do? What is it that we do? We sleep, we eat, we drink, we sustain ourselves for the next day. In the meanwhile, as we sustain ourselves, we indulge in life. Just like her.
So then, what is the purpose of life? I suppose, it’s just for your indulgence.
Why spend so much of it wondering? Just be a cat.
As the 15th century poet Kabir Das said: what did you bring with you into this world? What will you take with you? It’s only a journey of two days, a fair for a few days.
It’s just that, for us, that uncomfortable feeling goes away by hoarding and clinging on to imaginary numbers. We call it money.
Hurray for capitalism!