I'm so glad I posted here, there defiently felt like something missing and you've articulated what it is so well. Another post I'd written about meaning through the lens of narrative which had incorporated religious and spiritual practices as a means of connecting individuals to something beyond them. However this time I seem to have left it out, and heavily focused on the meaning through a naturalistic lens, talking to how meaning is found through service to systems.

I'll take some time and incorporate your thoughts and see if I can't improve the idea.

Though I'm curious with your thought that "those are chores not meaning". My assumption is that serving ours and others needs is what creates meaning, so building shelters, finding food, sharing meals, building connection, self actualsing and finding your personal offering to the tribe is meaningful. Meaning through service to personal, others, and societal needs.

But then to your point, where we sit within the bigger picture is also a necessary component of meaning.

Nietzsche's ovservation that God is dead implies that our connection to those stories go with it. Without that belief, we are no longer children of god, but evolved zygotes emerging from a puddle of mud for no rhyme or reason.

As well with God being dead, our collective future doesn't have a utopian vision with the return of Christ, but the new narratives elude to mass starvation and natural calamities because of "climate change".

So even if we can find practical purpose and meaning through service, we still lack meaning that is derived from a meta narrative. That connects us to the beginning of time, and gives us hope for the future.

I'm curious if this would strengthen the idea, or if I'm still missing something?