The Invisible Metric: Meaning

Consider Sisyphus, condemned to an eternity of rolling his boulder uphill. He had purpose, certainly, but no meaning. And that is the difference between momentum and madness. Without significance, even the most determined effort becomes an exercise in futility. Humans are no different. We require more than motion; we require meaning. Otherwise, our days become nothing more than an endless cycle—luxury poolside or not—where the emptiness inevitably sets in.

Viktor Frankl, with Man’s Search for Meaning, captured it perfectly. Survival alone was not enough; it was the meaning he assigned to suffering that allowed him to transcend it. And while most of us are not confronting life and death on a daily basis, the lesson holds: work without meaning, no matter how essential, becomes unbearable. Purpose without meaning is merely drudgery dressed up in ambition.

I reflect on this often. In nonprofit fundraising, patience isn’t just a virtue—it’s a requirement. Every dollar matters, yes. But fielding a tirade from a donor who believes a $200 contribution grants them a title and a throne? It’s hardly inspiring. In those moments, I recalibrate. I look beyond the transaction and remember the transformation: the exhibitions launched, the artists funded, the neighborhoods revitalized. It is meaning—not patience—that sustains me.

By contrast, my work as CEO of Nero Strategies Group and as an author carries an intrinsic clarity. Through my consulting, I advise major technology firms—names you know, even if I cannot say them—on how to adapt to the realities of human-AI collaboration. Every time you use their products, you see the ripple effects of the shifts I recommend. That is the power of meaning paired with purpose: when ideas do not simply exist, but shape the future in real time.

If your work does not provide meaning, you owe it to yourself to find it elsewhere. A paycheck will keep you afloat; meaning will keep you alive. They will not always arrive in tandem, and that’s perfectly fine—so long as you do not stop searching. Take up mentoring. Build something small but singular. Lend your mind to a cause that stirs you. Start where you are; tend what is yours to tend.

Because in the end, meaning is not found.
It is made.

And of course, should certain donors learn the lost art of civility, I might be persuaded to find a bit more meaning in fundraising. Wink.