When I sent my client a list of questions and action items early yesterday morning, I finished the list with a playful, “What’s the meaning of life?”

Then today, on this beautiful crisp morning, as I sat down on a patio chair for meditation, that question made its way through the candidates of my morning pause and begged for an answer.

As I’ve aged and as I’ve learned and as I’ve fallen and as I’ve grown and as I’ve listened, and as I’ve observed, my ideologies, beliefs, and values have been strengthened or have shifted and have had entirely new additions.

I’m not sure if there is a meaning “OF” life. There very well may be. The great philosophers have lobbied for multiple millennia over the Meaning Of prize. The Athenians (Plato, Socrates, Aristotle) would say it is happiness and a virtuous life; the Theist is about following God’s will; the Daoist follows the way to harmony; the Confucianist seeks moral character and benevolence. And the Subjectivist — of which I am one — believes that reality and my own “truth” is related to consciousness.

As a pedestrian window-shopping for what may be the meaning OF life, I can confidently say that I find meaning IN life.

As I exercise my level of consciousness and awareness, life’s meanings continuously flow like the current of a lazy river. I find meaning in the playtime with my little munchkin grandkids. I find it in the quiet moments at night when pondering the universe and its expanse. I find it when learning about and valuing others, especially in conversations that matter. I find it in the moments when we say nothing, but our spirits and touch say it all. I find it while pedaling on mountain trails and skippering my kayak through the rapids. I find it in the prose and poetry penned by the great authors who paint and interpret life in their words. I find it when my vocation is driven to build healing environments and much less about income or the creation of “wealth” (whatever that even means). I find it in the lyrics and the melody of others whose stories may have been mine. I find it in the natural and the supernatural.

And I find the meanings in life with and through you, my friends. Our chapters are fodder for an epic novel whose beautiful characters and magical acts are anything but fiction.