What “Seinfeld” Says About the Meaning of Life

This is a chapter in my book, How I Found Peace: 14 Revelations That Cleared My Mind. Hope you enjoy.

In 2021, Netflix agreed to buy the rights for “Seinfeld” for $500 million – $500 million! – for a five-year deal. For a show that hasn’t aired in 23 years and, I’m assuming, many people have already seen. 

But I don’t need that stat to tell you “Seinfeld” is perhaps the most popular and influential television show ever. The characters, from the stalwarts like Elaine to George to Kramer, to even the bit players like the Soup Nazi and David Puddy, will live on for decades. It was the first of its kind, it was razor-sharp, it pushed the envelope; it was brilliance. 

It’s also my personal favorite show of all time and it still makes me laugh hard, even though I’ve seen every episode at least four times. 

Okay, not exactly new information here – “Seinfeld” is popular. We get it.

What’s more interesting is exploring why it’s popular.

When you ask people why they love “Seinfeld,” they tend to say the same thing – it's relatable. The same things we all worry about and the same stupid situations we all get in are highlighted in the show.

There’s even an expression that everything in life can relate to a “Seinfeld” episode. That’s a bit of an exaggeration ... but not by much.

Concurrently, let’s take a look at the premise of the show. The premise is famous – it’s the show about nothing. Nothing!

Not literally nothing, I suppose, things happen in the show. But figuratively nothing.

The situations the actors get into almost never have lasting stakes or, even if they do, they don’t seem to mind much anyway. Even when they talk about serious topics – battles, the electric chair, death, on and on – they bring up the most inane, inconsequential topics about those situations (example – George wondering what Civil War soldiers used for toilet paper).

And the characters never learn anything or improve, they never transcend the self-created situations they get themselves into. Best example of this – the first conversation of the show and the last conversation in the show are exactly the same, with Jerry criticizing the placement of the second button on George’s shirt. 

We watched these characters for nine years get into all sorts of adventures, from Kramer being charged with murder to Jerry and George doing a pilot for NBC to George’s fiancée dying to Elaine’s up-and-down career to the incalculable amounts of breakups and disappointments, ending with the four of them being thrown in jail. And yet, despite all of that, they are still talking about the same stupid things.

They haven’t grown at all.

Okay, let’s rewind the past few paragraphs back. “Seinfeld” is one of the most popular shows ever because it’s perhaps the most relatable show ever. And yet, it’s a show about completely meaningless drivel, where the characters, despite a lifetime of ridiculous situations, learn nothing and wind up exactly where they started.

Let that sink in for a minute.

This is what we relate to as a society. We relate to nothing. We relate to meaninglessness. We relate to never transcending our own neuroses, never really going anywhere, and ending our run in the exact same spot we started it. 

Pretty depressing, right?

Honestly, it should be depressing. Any piece of enduring art, whether it be a painting or a sculpture or a sitcom, endures because it tells the truth.

“Seinfeld” unapologetically told the truth – most of us live a life devoid of meaning. Most of us don’t grow at all.

And it endures exactly for that reason.

I know – this isn’t exactly an inspiring essay so far. Let’s make it even more depressing by talking about combat veterans.

While not the case for all, many combat veterans have difficulty reacquainting to civilian life because of the banality of it. Being in battle is obviously awful, but it’s also about as invigorating as an experience a person can have. There’s no pontificating, there’s no wondering about the greater meaning of life, there’s no downtime or arguments about a shirt button; there’s nothing other than trying to survive and accomplish a mission.

It’s intense and it feels incredibly meaningful, literally a life-and-death situation. Contrast that to coming back home and having conversations about what color to paint the living room or what to serve at the dinner party.

This meaninglessness, the exact meaninglessness Seinfeld depicts so perfectly, crushes these veterans. They crave the intensity they felt in combat, often trying to re-create it by partying hard, via daredevil stunts, driving motorcycles, whatever. But nothing compares, and it leaves a perpetual void. 

While combat veterans feel this more acutely because they’ve experienced the exact opposite of the mind-numbing frivolousness of daily life, I think we’ve all had this feeling. This frustrating boredom of daily living, this overwhelming desire to feel something. 

It’s that exact feeling that causes us to wonder what this is all about, anyway. It makes us ask – why exactly are we here? What’s the point?

Yup, here’s where I explain what the meaning of life is. Buckle up.

I think “Seinfeld” shows us exactly what the meaning of life isn’t. And, while I’m sure Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David would hate to admit the show was even the slightest bit philosophical, I think it was profoundly so. Their message – life is meaningless and most of us don’t really grow at all.

Not exactly an inspiring message. But, perhaps, what it really means is – the normal life many of us lead is indeed meaningless. It’s an essay on what not to do. The challenge is going beyond that. 

Most of us ignore this warning, spending an inordinate amount of time – perhaps 90% of our day, perhaps 100% – thinking, worrying or doing things that have absolutely no meaning. The exact type of things George, Jerry, Elaine and Kramer do, which ultimately lead nowhere.

I can list out countless examples here. Our work, specifically our unending desire to move up and make more money, is basically meaningless. Anything related to anything material is clearly meaningless. The many small desires we have, like trying to impress others or win a game of cards, are meaningless. 

To counteract this, we try desperately to add meaning to things where there is none. Or, we simply dull that feeling, either through drugs or sports or gambling or the million other ways available to us, to distract ourselves from ourselves.

So, you are probably thinking right now – okay, hot shot. What’s meaningful?

I think, to answer that question, you first need to scrape away all the meaninglessness inside your brain. And that in itself is a lot of work.

That requires you getting rid of your many desires to impress others, the constant desire to make more and more money, our many petty grievances, etc. It requires you to be brutally honest with yourself, to ask yourself why and why again until you get to the true root cause – which is always a fear. And then, facing that fear and letting it go. 

What’s left after you strip away all that is meaningless?

I personally can’t say, because I’m still in the process of doing it. But if you listen to the very few people who have reached that state, they’ll tell you it’s the end of self. And instead, we reach what we really are, which is something far beyond skin, bones, and brain.

Here’s the point – you can spend your days climbing Mount Kilimanjaro or making millions of dollars or mastering calligraphy or watching television in your sweats, it doesn’t really matter. All of that stuff is the “Seinfeld” approach, where you do a lot of distracting things but never go anywhere.

Or you can grab a pen and paper and ask yourself why you want to do any of those things. Begin to question who you are and the many fears that drive what you do and how you feel each day. Begin to strip away all the fears that make you do the things you do.

Why is this meaningful, compared to anything else? Because here you are getting closer to the truth, instead of getting further intertwined in the many non-truths. Here, you take full control over your own life, and become the person you really are – instead of the false-self many of us let dominate our lives.

P.S.  The “Seinfeld” finale. 

I get it, it wasn’t that funny. But, looking back, the concept is genius.

The whole episode is an allegory of the final judgment. 

I believe the characters actually die in the plane crash. And then, they face St. Peter at the gates of heaven to see which direction they are headed: north or south.

In the episode, this judgment is done literally by a judge, as the impact of their lives is analyzed in court. The verdict is unanimous – the characters haven’t grown at all, they’ve been selfish their whole lives and they are bad people. 

Hence, they are sentenced to jail for a year, which is an obvious metaphor for hell. 

Despite this, as they sit in jail, George, Jerry, Elaine and Kramer are still not inspired to change, having the exact same conversation they had before. The assumption is that even after they are released again into the world (perhaps a metaphor for reincarnation?), they will be no different than where they left off, doomed to live the same life again and again and again.

The point Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld are making: Don’t let this be you. Don’t spend your life in this crippling neurosis. It’s a path quite literally to hell.

Pretty brilliant, right? I think so, even if the jokes don’t land.