Someone in the community I’m part of recently mentioned: With the universe so vast and the human history so long, it’s likely 99.9999% of what we do will probably be meaningless in the grand scheme of things.
This isn’t nihilism or pessimism. For me personally this was one of the most liberating quotes in a very long time.
Ultimately what it tells is, meaning and purpose are deeply personal and internal. Maybe the goal is not to make the proverbial dent in the universe; the universe has been and will be there, pretty indifferent to us. Maybe the goal is to make a dent in our life and the lives of those around us, who happen to be here and now for some reason. If that’s the case, what’s meaningful for us individually may be what’s meaningful for the entire universe.