Like everyone else has said, life is dictated/ motivated by instinctual drives to survive and reproduce. Interesting that we can overcome them though, become antinatilist and suicide.
Beyond that, I just think it's all coping mechanisms. It can be easier to live life when you feel like you have purpose. So, I suppose we naturally look for purpose and some of us may feel personally that we have found it. People who are naturally talented in something and are able to make their living out of it may feel they were born to do that particular thing. To an extent, it doesn't matter if the nihilists out there don't agree with them. So long as enough people like what they do- enough to pay them for it, they can pursue what brings them fulfilment.
As for a universal meaning though- how can there be one when we're all so different? Would it really make all our lives better if the purpose of life was to excel in maths say? That would only benefit those good at maths to begin with. Do you really want to follow an orthodox religion or, any rules come to that, if you don't agree with them all?
It's like- I can understand why people feel frustrated at not having the answers to the big questions but, I also find it perplexing. What would you like the meaning of life to be? If you accomplish it, what do you want as a reward? How about the people who don't comply? Should they be punished? How and why?
I tend to agree with other people that things like deeper meanings behind life, religion, all that stuff may well just be our conscious brains trying desperately hard to feel like we are important! I think it's our ego basically. It's a good survival mechanism too- convincing yourself that you are important in some way. That your life may have an intrinsic value or purpose that you need to live up to. Maybe it's just an extension of the survival instinct.
I think the reasons we hear the most are 'to find happiness' or, to 'fulfil your own potential'. I think both of those again- work towards keeping us alive and occupied. So really- they simply reinforce our natural drives to stay alive long enough to reproduce.