This is going to be anti-climactic, but I’m a pretty average guy. Engineer. Writer. Humble beginnings. That’s not really important, though.

I’m not some kind of guru, nor do I claim to be. What I am is a person who goes through the same struggles as everyone else. I swear when I spill my coffee. Get pissed when someone almost crashes into me in traffic. Worry about the trials of daily life. Provide for my loved ones the best I can. Sneeze a ton because of my terrible allergies and the dusty city I live in.

But, I’m also a person who can’t help but see the inherit emptiness of the modern life I’ve been presented with. What meaning does life have in a culture that prizes financial gain and transient fame above all else? Who do you look up to when we venerate celebrities and the most ruthless of the rich? How can religion even be an option when the most popular leaders spew hate and turn their backs on the founding tenets of their own faith? Why is it that no matter how much I accomplished, anxiety and depression continued to plague me?

Looking at my peers, I realized I wasn’t the only one with these questions. We’re anxious. Lonely. Hurting. Our predecessors traded their hearts for their wallets, and left their children with neither. In a country divided more each day, it’s important now more than ever to find a better way to live. How do I overcome the deluge of sound bytes and find real news? How do I find spiritual meaning among the hypocrisies of faith leaders? Do I even need spiritual meaning?

Above all, what I am is a person who has been asking the question: How do I live a life of meaning and hope in a world that seems dedicated to stripping those things from me?