what does the unexamined life is not worth living mean

"The unexamined life is not worth living" is a famous quote attributed to Socrates, which means that a life without self-reflection and introspection is not worth living. According to Socrates, the point of life is to learn from living, and if we rigidly adhere to any one line of thought, we will never be fully satisfied. Socrates believed that humans must scrutinize their lives in order to live a fulfilled one, and to become fully human means to use our highly developed faculty of thought to raise our existence above that of mere beasts. However, the quote can also be counter-argued by mentioning that all unexamined lives are not worth living is unreasonable. For many, life in itself is worth living whether it is examined or not.