One of the peculiar things about us human beings is our mortality. Ernest Becker explored it in general. Do you ponder the value of mortality? Do you think about your own mortality? I used to when I was about 12 years old. I wondered. I didn't care much about my own mortality, but I was worried about the fact that if my consciousness disappeared, would the entire universe disappear?

That was frightening. Did you ever find an answer to that question? No. Nobody's ever found an answer, but I stopped being bothered by it. It's kind of like Woody Allen in one of his films, you may recall. He goes to a shrink when he's a child and the shrink asks him, "What's your problem?" He says, "I just learned that the universe is expanding.

I can't handle that." And then another absurd question is, "What do you think is the meaning of our existence here, our life on earth, our brief little moment in time?" That's something we answer by our own activities. There's no general answer. We determine what the meaning of it is.

The action determined the meaning. Meaning in the sense of significance, not meaning in the sense that a chair means this. But the significance of your life is something you create.