So for the original question, hunting helped me for years. It gave me something to throw myself into to forget things that I couldn't at the time deal with effectively. I think it was my first and at the time only experience with "flow state" ie living 100% in the moment and not thinking (with thinking defined as remembering, rehearsing, and speculating). If I was walking in the woods looking for sign or a critter to shoot at, I was doing just that. Not remembering past traumas, judging myself for how I handled them, or painting grim scenes of my personal future and the condition of the universe in general based on a very small sample of experience.
But, eventually it got to the point where that and beer were about the only 2 ways I knew to deal with negative thoughts and emotions. We throw around the word "obsession" with regards to hunting in jest, but that's not a good word. It made me a pretty good hunter in pretty short order, but at the expense of a lot of the rest of life (family, friends, health, other hobbies/interests, etc.) I fortunately had a "come to Jesus" epiphany (not a Christian, but raised with the background and vernacular I suppose. Most succinct way to put the experience) that made me ready and willing to reevaluate premature conclusions about existence.
Currently, I'm in a happier place where hunting is a fun thing to do at the appropriate time. Last season I hunted less than I have in probably 10 years, and oddly enough I killed more deer-per-hunt than I probably ever have. I also started reading heavily again (college burned me out for years), started gardening and cooking, and made a concerted effort to take my wife fishing and camping (something she loves to do that I just didn't do enough of for several years).
As far as advice, I'd second everything that's been said. I'll add that for me, really trying to understand how those things help has helped me. If you or anybody else is a reader, I'd recommend the following if you suffer from lack of meaning and purpose:
- First, I'd recommend brushing up on our religions. Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Taoism cover most of what we've written on that subject over the past 5,000 years. There's definitely more (Jainism and Zoroastrianism are personally interesting, as are musings about pre-historic religions) but those give you the thoughts of the East, the West, and North Africa/Middle-East. For thousands of years and for millions of people, these have expressed the pinnacle of humanness. These writings are drama, poetry, and philosophy all rolled into one, and while some of their ideas about the cosmos are I think rightfully demoted to mythology in light of technological breakthroughs that let us literally see the invisible and weigh the immeasurable, they have served as "wisdom depositories" and remain invaluable.
- Huston Smith has a really good overview of those "major" religions: The World's Religions. He's not just a well-regarded scholar, he has a palpable enthusiasm and love for the religious traditions he writes on. You can also find the PBS series he did back in the black-and-white TV days if you'd rather do that.
- Stephen Mitchell has very beautiful translations of the Bhagavad Gita and the Tao te Ching. Those give you the essence of Hinduism and Taoism respectively, and are very brief and surprisingly vivid if you're used to the Christian testaments. You can read the Tao te Ching at lunch, and the Gita in a day or two.
- Easwaran has a very readable Dhamapada (Buddhism) with excellent commentary.
- Alan Watts also has very lighthearted and easy-to-comprehend lectures about Eastern thought, particularly the merging of Hindu and Taoist thought that became Zen Buddhism. A lot of them are on youtube, and his son is putting them all out in podcast format currently.
- Confucius' Analects don't really fall into the religious category to me. It's been argued that Confucianism and Taoism are better viewed as philosophical texts as opposed to religious ones. But...Simon Leys has a very readable English translation. If you read it and the Dao, you have a better-than-average understanding of pre-communist Chinese thought that produced wonderful things for thousands of years and millions of people.
- I'm assuming you're familiar with the Christian Bible. To me, Genesis, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, the Gospel of John, and Romans are the highlights. John in particular to me encapsulates the stuff Christianity has that took it from just another sect of Judaism to a major world religion that has changed the world in innumerable ways. There are NUMEROUS translations, and a quick trip to Barnes and Noble puts them all in front of you to decide what you like.
- You can get a good dose of Judaism from the Old Testament readings, but the Tanakh is a cool book to have on your shelf too.
- The Koran is...difficult. I have not found a good translation for a native english speaker, and I suspect that has something to do with Islam's belief that the Koran is the literal "recitation" of Allah and is meant to be heard, memorized, and recited in its original Arabic. But as somebody whose view of Islam was shaped by watching my morning cartoons change to news footage while I ate Cheerios one morning, it's strange how reasonable and non-jihadi most of it is. Lots of what would have been pretty progressive stuff about caring for orphans and rudimentary women's rights in there, and a general rejection of the tribal violence and superstition that plagued Mohammed's time.
- Western Philosophy isn't nearly as fun as religious texts. I think we made a critical error when we decided the emotions should be a slave to reason. I have some of the Stoics on my shelf (Epictetus, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius) and a handful of various later guys I've found more or less interesting. But, honestly, there's a great podcast called Philosophize This! that does a wonderful job summarizing 3000 years of thought into a relatively manageable amount of listening time. First episode goes all the way back to the very colorful musings of the pre-Socratics, and he goes all the way up until the present day. I'd say listen to that while reading religious texts, and in a year you could give yourself a very good education in 5000 years of, "Why Universe? Why me ask, "Why Universe?""
- And the icing on the cake is contemporary science. Specifically, I think evolutionary biology and neuroscience are taking up the torch in wonderful ways when it comes to understanding human nature and the eternal battle between our better angels and baser impulses. I personally don't have much patience for a lot of psychology, but I believe that before we developed the tech that made neuroscience possible people like Jung and Freud made big steps forward in that regard. I'm not really scientifically and mathematically literate (working on it) and I assume you aren't either, so just go for the popularizer stuff. I've read and deeply enjoyed:
- Darwin's Origin of Species and his later work, The Descent of Man. Not very technical, maybe a little stilted because 1800s, but good reads that introduce probably the most important paradigm shift in the west for 2000 years. His journals are fun too.
- Daniel Dennets', Darwin's Dangerous Idea, does a good job detailing the implications of Darwin's Theory, which continues to upset a lot of what many people got into the habit of presupposing.
- Either/or/both Dawkins, The Selfish Gene or The Blind Watchmaker. For me, these were the books that made genetic selection "click." Fair warning if you don't recognize the names, Dennets and Dawkins more familiar works are pretty scathing criticisms of Christianity and religion in general. I don't recall the works listed being heavy with that, but read enough and you'll definitely find viewpoints that are likely aggressively at odds with yours. It may or may not interest you to delve into that.
- Almost anything by E.O. Wilson. Gotta give him some love since he's an Alabama homeboy who went from playing with ants in the Mobile-Tensaw Delta to being one of the world's foremost biologists and THE most influential myrmecologist the world has ever seen. Science is tricky in that what's "canon" today is laughable tomorrow due to the ridiculous progression we're making, but my understanding is that his theories on eusocial behavior and group selection are currently one of the best explanations of how altruism, empathy, and compassion "make sense" from an evolutionary viewpoint.
- David Eagleman has provided me an enjoyable introduction into neuroscience. The Brain, is a quick and fun read that really puts you in your place and leaves you awestruck at the same time. He's got a lot of content on Youtube as well.
- Hoffman's The Case Against Reality is a great and humbling read.
- And finally, anything by good ole Neil DeGrasse Tyson or Carl Sagan is liable to leave you entertained and curious.
I know that's a lot of reading, but I'd add regular reading in there with good sleep, good food, and good friends, and good exercise as necessary and important. What's funny is you'll find that all the world's religions, Eastern and Western philosophy, and cutting-edge science endorse those things. But, to use a Buddhist metaphor, they're all just the finger pointing at the moon. At some point you have to get up and
do.