Claim. Without a purposeful perspective on death and destiny, the years a person counts as “lived” shrink to nothing — the determining question is not lifespan but the destination toward which life is oriented.
Elaboration. “Where will we go after this life? People must resolve this important issue. Religions and philosophies arose historically to do this” (1.2. What is our destiny?, 8-194, 1959.12.20). SMM offers a calculation: deducting sleep, work, eating, and incidental obligations from an eighty-year lifespan leaves “roughly seven years” of actual lived time, “and of those seven years, how many days could you claim to have truly lived?” (ibid, 49-336, 1971.10.24). The implication is destination-first: “These questions can never be answered without God. Without Him, we cannot find our true purpose in life” (ibid, 21-100, 1968.11.17). The cicada metaphor — preparing underground to fly in the air — anchors the same point: the larval stage’s preparation determines the adult stage’s flight.
See also. csg-human-life-has-no-self-origin