Deeper Questions Episode 21: "Is meaning overrated?" with Wendy Syfret

Episode 21: "Is meaning overrated?"

In 2021, 38.9% of respondents to the census declared themselves to be “no religion” in Australia. That was almost 10 million people. You might also have heard about “the meaning crisis” Some secular thinkers like John Vervaeke have been exploring the void of anxiety and emptiness since around 2017. Many thinkers in this “meaning crisis” movement have explored Eastern religions and other philosophies to find a way to quench that thirst for meaning.

But what if there was another way to think about meaning? What if meaning was just overrated? Do we ascribe meaning to things we don’t need to? Is there a surplus rather than a deficit of meaning? To explore this question, we reached out to journalist and cultural writer Wendy Syfret, author of “The Sunny Nihilist: how a meaningless life can make you truly happy”. She has some interesting ideas that we can all benefit from, regardless of whether we are religious or of 'no religion'.

Other References:

• The Sunny Nihilist: how a meaningless life can make you truly happy, by Wendy Syfret.
• Optimistic Nihilism from the "Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell" Youtube Channel.
• The Book of Ecclesiastes from Biblegateway
• John Vervaeke’s Youtube Channel

Got questions?

Some people find this philosophy liberating, others might find it confronting, let us know how it made you feel. You can shoot us an email about anything at deeperquestions@thirdspace.org.au - We'd love to hear your brutally honest or delightfully encouraging thoughts on the show and the topics that come up each week.

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Deeper Questions is produced by Production Farm Studios