You’re standing in a grocery store aisle, staring at sixteen different types of olive oil, and suddenly it hits you. Not the oil. The realization that you’re just a person in a jacket, in a building, on a planet. It's a weird, floating feeling. People often say they are searching for a "purpose," but most of the time, we are actually in the midst of meaning without even realizing it. We treat meaning like a destination, a golden trophy at the end of a long, dusty marathon. But language experts and philosophers will tell you that’s not how the prepositional phrase or the existential concept actually works.
Meaning isn't a place you arrive at. It’s the atmosphere you’re currently breathing.
What Does In the Midst of Meaning Actually Mean?
Let's get the grammar out of the way first because it’s where most people trip up. When you use the phrase "in the midst of," you are describing being surrounded by something or being deep in the middle of a process. If you say you are in the midst of meaning, you are suggesting that your current situation—no matter how chaotic or mundane—is currently saturated with significance.
It’s about proximity.
Think about the way the British psychologist Viktor Frankl described his experiences in Man’s Search for Meaning. He didn't find meaning after he survived the concentration camps. He found it while he was there, in the tiny, microscopic interactions between prisoners or the way a sunset looked over a barbed-wire fence. He was literally in the middle of it. He was in the thick of a horrific situation, yet the "meaning" was the very fabric of his survival.
Most people use "midst" to talk about storms or crises. "In the midst of a pandemic." "In the midst of a divorce." But when you apply it to "meaning," the tone shifts from survival to observation. It turns a noun into an environment.
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The Cognitive Trap of "Finding" Purpose
We’ve been sold a bit of a lie by the self-help industry. The narrative is always: "I was lost, and then I found my meaning." This implies that meaning was a set of keys dropped in the grass. It's binary. You either have it or you don't.
That’s not how the human brain processes value.
Cognitive scientists often discuss "sense-making." This is the active process of structuring our experiences. When you are in the midst of meaning, you aren't "finding" anything; you are "creating" or "noticing." Dr. Crystal Park, a researcher at the University of Connecticut, has spent decades studying how people create meaning during stressful life events. Her research suggests that there is a "Global Meaning" (your big-picture beliefs) and "Situational Meaning" (how you interpret a specific event).
Most of us are constantly vibrating between these two. You’re in the midst of it when you're washing dishes and realize this act of service for your family is part of your global value system. It’s not a grand epiphany. It’s a quiet click.
The Linguistic Evolution of "Midst"
Language is funny. The word "midst" comes from the Middle English middes. It’s inherently messy. It implies being surrounded on all sides. When we talk about being in the midst of meaning, we’re moving away from the linear idea of a "path."
A path is one-dimensional. You go forward or backward.
Being "in the midst" is three-dimensional. It’s a sphere.
If you look at how writers like Virginia Woolf or James Joyce handled their prose, they weren't interested in the "ending" of the story. They were obsessed with the "stream of consciousness"—the literal midst of a character’s internal life. To them, the meaning wasn't the plot point. It was the way the light hit a bowl of fruit while a character was thinking about a lost love.
Why the Context Matters
Context is the oxygen of meaning. Without it, everything is just noise.
Imagine you see a man running down the street.
- Is he a thief?
- Is he training for a 5K?
- Is he trying to catch a bus to see his newborn daughter?
The physical action is identical. The "meaning" is entirely dependent on the "midst." If he's in the midst of a race, the meaning is athletic achievement. If he's in the midst of a family emergency, the meaning is devotion. We often try to judge the meaning of our lives by looking at the actions (the running) rather than the context (the why).
Honestly, we spend way too much time worrying about the "what" and not enough about the "where." Where are you positioned in relation to your values? If you feel empty, it’s usually not because your life lacks "meaningful things." It’s because you’ve stepped out of the "midst" and started looking at your life as a spectator rather than a participant.
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The Role of Chaos and Suffering
You can't talk about being in the midst of meaning without talking about the hard stuff. It’s easy to feel meaningful when you’re at a wedding or holding a trophy. It’s significantly harder when you’re in the middle of a corporate restructuring or dealing with a chronic illness.
There is a concept in psychology called Post-Traumatic Growth (PTG). It’s the idea that people can emerge from a crisis with a higher level of functioning than before. But the growth doesn't happen after the crisis is over. The growth happens while the person is still struggling.
They are in the midst of the pain, and because the pain has stripped away the superficial layers of their life, they are forced to confront what actually matters. The meaning is forged in the heat. It’s not a silver lining. A silver lining is something you see from the outside. Growth is something you feel while you’re still in the clouds.
Stop Looking for "The" Meaning
One of the biggest mistakes we make is using the definite article. The meaning of life.
As if there’s only one.
When you’re in the midst of meaning, you realize there are thousands of meanings. There is the meaning of this specific cup of coffee. There is the meaning of this specific conversation. There is the meaning of this specific period of grief.
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If you’re waiting for the "Big One" to show up, you’re going to miss the thousands of "Little Ones" that are currently surrounding you. It’s like standing in the middle of a forest and complaining that you can’t find any wood.
Practical Ways to Re-Enter the "Midst"
If you feel disconnected or like you’re just going through the motions, you’ve likely drifted to the periphery of your own life. You aren't "in the midst" anymore; you're on the sidelines. To get back in, you have to change your scale of observation.
- Shift from "What" to "How." Don't ask what you're doing. Ask how you are doing it. Are you doing it with presence? Are you doing it with an awareness of how it connects to your broader goals?
- Acknowledge the Mess. The "midst" is rarely tidy. If your life feels chaotic, stop trying to fix the chaos before you look for the meaning. The meaning is often in the chaos. It’s the reason you’re bothering to deal with the mess in the first place.
- Use "Micro-Definitions." Define the meaning of the next hour. Not the next year. Just the next sixty minutes. If the meaning of the next hour is "rest," then resting becomes a profound act instead of a lazy one.
We tend to think that meaning is something we achieve. We treat it like a career milestone or a bank balance. But being in the midst of meaning is a state of being. It’s a refusal to let the present moment be "filler" for some future event.
The next time you feel overwhelmed or lost, stop trying to find the exit. Look at what’s right in front of you. The significance isn't waiting for you at the end of the tunnel. It’s the light that’s allowing you to see the walls of the tunnel right now.
Turning Insight into Action
Meaning is a practice, not a discovery. To stay anchored in the midst of your own life’s significance, you have to stop treating your daily tasks as obstacles to your "real" life.
- Audit your "midst." Take a literal look around you right now. Who are the people in your immediate orbit? What are the responsibilities currently demanding your time? Instead of viewing them as burdens, identify one way each of them reflects a core value you hold.
- Reframe your language. Stop saying "I'll be happy when..." or "My life will matter once..." and start using "In the midst of this [current situation], I am [action/value]."
- Document the mundane. For one week, write down three things that happened that were "meaningful" but not "important." A joke with a stranger. The way the rain sounded. This retrains your brain to see the meaning that is already present.
The transition from searching for meaning to being in the midst of meaning is the most important shift a person can make. It moves you from a state of lack to a state of abundance. You don't need to change your life to find meaning; you just need to change where you're standing. Stop looking at the horizon and start looking at your feet. You're already there.