When I’m unhappy, I feel like I’m doing life wrong. I’d rather be happy. But is happiness the point of life, or is there more to it? If I pursue happiness, mine first then for those around me, is that selfish? But if there’s a bigger purpose, then what about people with Alzheimer’s or dementia who can’t recall recent experiences or make plans?
That’s a valid way of looking at it, too.
Realistically, the concept of “purpose” doesn’t exist in the universe outside of our imagination any more than justice, beauty, or morality. Things just are what they are and follow the laws of physics.
If we’re making it all up as we go along, there aren’t any wrong answers. I claim the purpose of living things is to reproduce, but it’s true that living things reproduce because that’s what living things do (otherwise we’d have run out of them by now). Kind of a chicken/egg thing there.