Let others play with “strategy” and “tactics” and “management”. Purpose is the game of champions.
– from the book Purpose: The Starting Point of Great Companies
by Nikos Mourkogiannis
The concept of Higher Purpose has grown from an inkling of a gut feeling for me to a full-blown important meme for what I’m thinking…even more important than embracing the chaos.
As I’ve said before, this is not your mission or vision statement. It is not akin to Guy Kawasaki’s mantra. It’s not an exercise in exploiting people’s desire to believe in something. Hugh Macleod comes close with his statement, “The market for something to believe in is infinite,” but even that leaves open the door to the creation of something to believe in.
Nikos Mourkogiannis, in his book about Purpose opens his first chapter telling a very personal story about all of the women in his village being gunned down for standing by their principles. He promised himself from that day forward that he would live a life driven by purpose. He would continue to live a life driven towards freedom for all. His conviction is strong throughout the book, although I believe he idolizes the inauthentic ‘freedom’ brought on by loads of capital a little too much, not quite examining the costs that go with it, but his premise is entirely compelling.
He looks at a cross-section of American business and compares those business leaders with and without Purpose, some of them very open about their Purpose (like Henry Ford, who, on trial in 1914 argued “that businesses run solely for shareholder profit would ultimately make less money than businesses run for Purpose.” [p.26], and Warren Buffet). What he sees is that Purpose is the differentiating factor between a business that is good and one that is great…and a movement that is successful and one that is legendary. It’s the ‘next level’. That je ne sais quoi. Mojo.
I can tie this strongly back to my strong affinity for Marcus Buckingham‘s ideas on leadership as well. Marcus Buckingham’s leaders aren’t those who aim to please, who are filled with empty confidence, who read ‘leadership books’ and regurgitate the lessons within them. No, Buckingham’s leaders are driven towards a greater vision. The successful ones articulate it in meaningful ways that people can get behind. Their passion for making the world a better place is infectious, but they also guide people towards the end in simple, easy to follow steps. They don’t try to solve everything, just something.
In one chapter, Mourkogiannis mentions the idea of a ‘Community of Purpose’. I haven’t quite finished the book, so I don’t know if he actually expands on what he means there, but when I heard the phrase, my struggle with Community as well as Higher Purpose in the context of making a living all of a sudden came crashing together in a way that made perfect sense. You don’t create communities around web apps or products or movies or even ideas…community is born around Purpose. The movies (like ‘An Inconvenient Truth’) and web apps (like Flickr) and events (like BarCamp) are merely the tools that help us find one another…that articulate what we already believe in. They make it simple for us to convene around those ideas and give us a point of reference to recognize one another.
They are our tribal markings. The more exact the Purpose is and the more clearly it is articulated, the more likely we are to connect.
Thus, saying your web app is for everyone makes it excruciatingly difficult for a person who uses it to know that their neighbour using it has anything in common with them at all. Designing a web app for elementary school teachers comes closer. Designing a web app to help elementary school teachers take their boring curriculums and turn them easily into really engaging lesson plans that will get kids interested in learning again is highly purposeful and will strike up powerful connections between the school teachers using it. If it does it amazingly well, you’ve got yourself the online version of the next Sesame Street.
Higher Purpose is powerful, but only if true. Ad hoc-ly choosing a Higher Purpose or sitting in a boardroom trying to brainstorm it is ridiculously fruitless and will result in really poor results. Similarly, having a true Higher Purpose, then waffling to be ‘safe’ or get inline with investor requirements will also result in poor outcomes. It’s not really a Higher Purpose when nobody else will get behind it.
Time goes by and now I’m confused. Struggling with my confusion I turn to my friendly Firefox “Find in this page” feature. I key in “nap” (not a bad idea I think, a nap…) and there revealed are all the references to Napoleon. It helps to use the tools. You can use them too!
Regarding purpose “changing, shifting, and growing…” — I’m surprised. The Higher Purpose you describe in the post seems monolithic. Oh well. I imagine it all comes down to the Emersonian foolish consistency/hobgoblin thingy.
You deleted a comment or two by me? Why? I am not “mean”, I am simply debating an issue. This is a healthy vigorous debate. It is what blogs are all about.
Hey all,
Surfed over from Chris’ e-mail… look, I think judging other HP’s is critical to living an enlightened life. Stated HP’s such as “bringing freedom and democracy to the world” are pretty f*ckin’ dangerous, and at the end of the day, plain and simply wrong.
I don’t claim to have a well-defined HP myself, a lot of the time feeling like David has aptly described – and I’m not convinced that is a bad thing. As demonstrated herein, it can be blinding, especially when it’s a load of politico-religious hogwash. But when you’re in a position of leadership (political, executive, or spiritual), and you’re blinding followers with your HP laser set to “stun”, causing them misery, death, suffering, repression, stupidity, cancer, consumerism and ankle warts – I think people need to step up and call BS.
So, within that framework, I’m all for judging.
Tara, I know what you meant – and I’m commenting more on the comments than the substance of your piece – there does need to be a shared perception of overlapping needs/purpose for collaborative success in almost any organized pursuit.
/aac
And what about before recorded history?
Though, you are right above the Cave. It is great to advance your understandings and to learn more. I think the confusion comes from trying to delineate between the objective and subjective and the knowable and unknowable while improperly assuming that we are actually capable of doing either, objectively, with very limited languages and a very limited brain. I don’t mean to insult our abilities as such; I simply realize that we can’t visualize the 11th dimension without knowing everything about the first 10 nor can we float complex ideas containing more than some arbitrary number of interconnected relationships. We aren’t good understanding complexity and few of us are willing to spend 20 years contemplating the structure of the universe [insert Einstein.jpg here].
There is nothing wrong with asking about purpose except, perhaps, to continue to ask about purpose after you realize that questions about purpose are the wrong questions to ask
We tend to ask “what is the purpose of the universe” when we know (or can reasonably surmise due to lack of evidence) the universe has no intention. It serves little purpose asking questions about the purpose of the universe or life.
A far more useful question is “what is my purpose [in life]?” or other related questions about the intention of observable objects.
But to answer questions about universal purpose assumes you are capable of knowing just as much as the universe would need to know if it itself had intention and purpose. Surely you can never hope to expect that of yourself nor can you expect that any answer you come up with will be universally adequate.
What you (we) are dealing with is the human need to have an explanation for all unresolved things (possibly to avoid the anxiety that unresolved questions create; see Shermer).
If we (or anyone) has a purpose, it might be simply to exist in a continuum of connectedness to provide the support to maintain the continuum of connectedness. You learn so that others, generations down the road, might know more; but you yourself will never have all the answers.
I know, recursive double talk; allow me to attempt to explain it as a religious belief:
Suppose there is a God which created the Universe which produced Humans which are capable of Thought. It then follows that Thought is somehow an important point of the system’s evolution (we don’t know what comes after Thought, yet). What would God need our Thought for? And why create a Universe which produced Humans as Thinkers? Might one surmise that God wants us to think about something? What? Some question(s) even God itself can’t answer for which God created the entire Universe to aid in answering?
Now picture, if you will, that all of your books say that God created the Universe because God had an Unanswered Question for which Human Thought was required to Resolve. (Caps Intentional). When each Human Thinker dies, God’s almighty finger digs deep info the virtual skull of the floating soul and probes around. “Hmmm, another person who watched ‘Friends’, nothing to learn here. Next! … Hmmm, someone who was abused by a priest, married their sister, read tons of books, and farmed. Wow. Deeper. Deeper. I see. The Farmer’s right! That’s it! That’s the answer to the Universe! THE PURPOSE OF MY UNIVERSE IS TO CREATE FERTILIZER SO THAT LIFE CAN CREATE MORE FERTILIZER WHICH FEEDS MORE LIFE AND THUS CREATES FERTILIZER!”
Now even God would be shocked by this circular revelation on a number of grounds, which you can easily surmise; but the most important one would be “what next?” The Unanswered Question has been answered. What next? In other words: circular double talk or not: what purpose then does knowing the purpose produce?
Purpose implies intention. Who is The Intender? Why is their intention better than others’ Intentions?
Whatever your “higher purpose” is; you can never articulate it beyond something that becomes a “limited purpose” and is useless beyond the point (mood, emotion, situation) which needed to created it. Much in life and society is also circular, constantly seeking balance to maintain its stasis; the ‘purpose’ of which is simply to maintain itself.
You nor I are smart enough to comprehend things beyond our inability to deal with true complexity. There is nothing wrong with trying — all objective reality and progress requires us to think; but creating a group stuck on an ideology always leads to problems — this is an unavoidable fact about human societies — and nearly always results in someone proclaiming “higher purpose” as the ultimate answer; for which non-believers tend to die.
Thus, it is far better to appreciate all things and appreciate that some things simply can’t be explained using inadequate human languages produced by a brain which wants to avoid complexity.
We should endeavor to learn to deal with the anxiety of “not knowing” or being able to say, “I don’t know” and accept that “we never can know”. That doesn’t mean we can’t continue to learn: it simply means we need to learn to ask more useful questions, learn to understand complexity [thus avoid simple reductionism] and understand that all of our emotions don’t have a spiritual meaning. [And 10,000 other things ;]
Best & respectfully,
Joey
I left the comments that were part of the healthy, vigorous debate. Blogs, to me too, are about discussion. I just found the other comments to be mean-spirited and posturing rather than additions to the discussion/debate. Feel free to re-post what you are trying to say.
I am quite astonished that you would filter out comments based on “mean-spirited” and “posturing”. Not criteria that I would use ever, but it’s your blog and you can do whatever you want.
Since Chris Locke’s essay mentions Kierkegaard….”The task is not to find the lovable object, but to find the object before you lovable.” – Soren Kierkegaard, from “Works of Love.”
Often we discount what we are working this very minute too easily in the search for something that is higher, better, loftier. Later. Bring your best to every task every minute.
I just wrote about Higher Purpose spinning off from this post today. I got challenged on it by a friend that knows me and how purpose shows up through me in the world.
I think HP can be compromised by getting too worked up around having one by our own willfulness, selfishness, and hidden desires for world domination (serious!). That’s why I purposefully used Buckminster Fuller as my role model/hero since on the throes of throwing himself into Lake Michigan, “it suddenly struck him that his life belonged, not to himself, but to the universe.” Here was my response back to my friend:
I totally with you that we are going to do what we do, yes. I don’t advocate stressing about not knowing if you have a higher purpose or not. Or worrying if you are doing ‘it’ right or not.
I have spent too much time in past fretting whether I was living my purpose and since I wasn’t quite sure what my purpose was that gave me a lot to stress about – rather than just living that minute, and the next minute, and the next. (It’s not really YOUR higher purpose anyhow.)
In the living of it, the purpose unfolds.
I really am growing fond of the surfing metaphor more and more: Ride the wave.
I just end up doing the next most obvious thing, and then the next. However, I did feel at times as if something wanted to birth through me, and I resisted and resisted and resisted because in the eyes of society it would seem too impractical and imprudent. So that’s what I want to challenge in myself. Am I really cooperating with the inevitable, or I being willful and refusing to participate in Life because _____.
In the end, C.’s refrigerator magnet says it all: “Ask your heart what’s right, and follow it.” Although that’s the training wheels version to get practice. It becames our nature, not our second nature, to just follow our heart without asking and without reservations. And so without even being aware of any higher purpose or striving towards higher purpose we end up on purpose totally spontaneously.
Wow, Joey, lovely. I also concur with both you & Tara on Plato’s Cave allegory as being something quite profound. A turning point if one contemplates it in an open-ended manner. Although I never found it to be about purpose specifically as much as what is nature of the universe and reality…and would I want to really know?
I understand where Joey is coming from, but I’m not certain that Tara is suggesting that we can or even need to know the higher purpose from any cosmic level to proceed. We don’t need to know, and that’s okay. I think as I suggested in earlier comment we might allow ourselves as individuals to be ameniable to living out any inspired vision that is already making its way into heart.
I was just reading about the the painter, writer and social visionary . He was a close friend of Yeats and he was behind the Celtic Revival, an Irish cultural and spiritual movement that lasted from 1885 to 1915. He acted from what he deemed higher purpose, but he also was quite aware that he was an agent, and not so much operating from his own agency. He was an advocate of imagination and said “the immortal in us has memory of all its wisdom…” and “…when it speaks to us we feel truly inspired and a mightier creature than ourselves speaks THROUGH us.”
When I’m stumped about higher purpose showing up, I’ve found a little time each day in quiet helps set the tone for the rest of the day:
“The self-conscious mind cannot reach silent knowing, but silent knowing can reach into it at rare moments when the internal talk ceases, allowing other things to be heard. Everyone has these moments, when the world turns quiet and an indefinable calm washes over us.” – Not in His Image, by John Lamb Lash
It is at these times that the clarity makes the next step more obvious, especially since HP can seem so hugely overwhelming – where would you begin?
Oops, somehow my comment left out George William Russell’s name identifying him as the painter, writer and social visionary. (more via wikipedia)
Personally, the idea that markets are brainless, mindless things I find repulsive. For the simple reason that all markets consist of people, doing what needs to be done to further their own, private, purposes.
(Note the plural: purposes.)
You may think you know best how markets *should* be, and how people engaged in them *should* operate: good for you.
Now convince more people that your ideas have merit, by showing them how your way will advance their myriad purposes more effectively, and people will follow.
Just want to bitch and call them names because you haven’t or can’t do this? Well, that gets no respect from me.
And Miss Rogue, how come THAT comment didn’t even hit your “mean guys” radar?
Please don’t tell me it’s because you agree with it? That you think it’s ok to diss the people you disagree with, while holding high moral standards about people dissing what you agree with?
In my country, the Maori have a saying: What is the greatest treasure? It is people, it is people, it is people.
Without markets, and the right to engage them on their own terms, the people suffer under the purposes of their rulers.
The sad thing in this whole conversation is that many people, including myself and I think I can say C. Locke, have been burned by Higher Purposers.
Rogues and con men hide under this mantle of “Hey, I got a Higher Purpose”, a cloak that the”mean kids” of blogocombat were clobbering and dismantling with gleeful zeal.
Someone claims to “have a ministry”, “lead a congregation”, “run an insight seminar”, “write human-empowerment mytho-poetic auto-suggestology manuals”, or “teach harmony drills”, and the wounded ones flee with cackling and snide asides.
A good Higher Purpose might be to destroy the klesas, envy, strife, greed, materialism within us, scorch the seeds.
Or, as Patanjali might say:
1. Now then Yoga is being explained.
2. Yoga is the suppression of the modifications of the mind.
3. Then the Seer abides in Itself.
4. At other times the Seer appears to assume the form of the modification of the mind.
5. They (modifications) fall into five varieties, of which some are ‘Klista’ and the rest ‘Aklista’.
6. (They are) Pramana, Viparyaya, Vikalpa, (dreamless) sleep and recollection.
7. (Of these) Perception, inference and testimony (verbal communication) constitutethe Pramanas.
8. Viparyaya or illusion is false knowledge formed of a thing as other than what it is.
9. The modification called ‘Vikalpa’ is based on verbal cognition in regard to a thingwhich does not exist. (It is a kind of useful knowledge arising out of the meaning of a word but having no corresponding reality. ).
10. Dreamless sleep is the mental modification produced by the condition of inertia as the state of vacuity or negation (of waking and dreaming).
11. Recollection is mental modification caused by reproduction of the previous impression of an object without adding anything from other sources.
12. By practice and detachment these can be stopped.
13. Exertion to acquire Sthiti or a tranquil state of mind devoid of fluctuations is called practice.
14. That practice when continued for a long time without break and with devotion becomes firm in foundation.
15. When the mind loses all desire for objects seen or described in the scriptures it acquires a state of utter desirelessness which is called detachment.
16. Indifference to the Gunas or the constituent principles, achieved through a knowledge of the nature of Purusha, is called Paravairagya (supreme detachment).
;^)
Sorry about the long quote, but seems appropo.
Go Joey!
The purpose of DNA is to make more DNA…
Cheers,
Kevin
Hmmm, Vaspers, isn’t it possible that those folks weren’t acting from any higher purpose, simply higher ego? Ego has a clever way of usurping language, including the language of purpose for its purpose. I agree there may be no higher purpose than to know Thyself:
“When the mind loses all desire for objects seen or described in the scriptures it acquires a state of utter desirelessness which is called detachment.”
Detachment doesn’t mean nothing ever happens. What shifts is it happens THROUGH us, rather than BY us.
The tone of advocacy in your post would seem to suggest this is an important matter to you. You cite an arresting anecdote that suggests higher purpose can originate in a crucible of violence. We do not know what the higher purpose of the people gunning the women down might have been, but it’s certainly possible they had one. Purposiveness and violence are linked from the beginning of your discussion.
And yet, you add, in the thread, “I couldn’t judge anyone else’s HP.”
Advocacy of a mode of power that absolves itself from judgments regarding the source, mode, use, effects and justification of that power is a peculiar form of advocacy.
Man, I rarely bother to leave comments either, and mine got deleted as well! Despite, I hasten to add, the fact that it was lucid and on-point, if not entirely free of funnin’. But then, when has the wonderchicken been entirely free of funnin’, I ask you.
Ah well, here’s to Marketsations, or Convershillificatin’, or whatever the hell the koolaid de jour is these days.
I’m disappointed. I read all the way through this thread, thinking shurely shomeone’s going to quote the great Navin R. Johnson…
OK, this may not be the most insightful addition to the conversation, but (to channel Jerry Garcia for a moment) somebody has to do something and it’s just incredibly pathetic that it has to be me.
Everything I need to know about purpose, I learned from Navin.
And, no, I am emphatically not casting nasturtiums here. Not suggesting for a moment that anyone’s a jerk. Merely adding a sprinkle of twinkly frosting to the over-baked cake. YMMV, usual disclaimers apply, always read the warning label, light blue touch paper and retire to a safe distance…
We need a Higher Purpose. We just need to be very wary of Higher Purposers who use Higher Purpose posings to conceal Lower Purposes.
Head in heaven, heart in hellers.
A purpose needs to accurately reflect reality or it’s destructive. Eugenics and racism is a false representation of human qualities. Any purpose, however idealistic and to the “benefit of man”, that’s premised on a false reality will be destructive in it’s implementation.
Tara, the thing that got the ball rolling here was how you responded to the very first comment on this post, your casual dismissal of just some guy’s assertion that family and relationships might matter more than ‘Higher Purpose,’ that some people just make software and call it a day.
Your reply “That’s sad for you. Sorry to hear this. Good luck!” is the perfect depiction of what Higher Purpose is really about.
You invoke ‘mean kids’ throughout your comment complaints, never once recignizing that shame dumping and shutting down conversation with casual sweeps of a hand is MEAN and maddening.
Maybe you were reading this whole discussion on a mobile device. How did you read the substance of this thread and get to where you got to? Here, you have poured a gazillion paragraphs of assertions on hot embers of topics like purpose and privilege, and then quip back when someone says, excuse me but have you thought of x, y, or Z?
In this discussion, you are accusing others of acts of bullying without recognizing the bully in yourself. I take shame dumping lightly.
I leave you with this:
How can you say Hitler had a Higher Purpose, and in the same breath say that you can’t judge someone else’s Higher Purpose?
Forget ‘purpose,’ what does “Higher” mean to you?
okay, i have to go do lower purpose activies now, like get my kid to school.
…I “Don’t” take shame dumping lightly. (and my coffee is still brewing.)
A disillusioned shark, grown weary of the repetitive cycles of his predatory existence, undertook a pilgrimage to find that Great Seer of the Seven Seas – the wise and ancient Giant Squid.
Many months he travelled the oceans, pausing in his relentless search only briefly to hunt the halibut necessary for him to survive. As he moved ever further into international waters, far from his home, the halibut that were the mainstay of his diet grew scarcer and harder to find. Undaunted, he continued in his quest for the Great Seer.
Eventually, after almost a year, half-starved from lack of halibut and exhausted from his journey, he found the fabled home of the Giant Squid, deep in an ocean trench.
“Teach me, oh guru!” he petitioned, collapsing in front of the Seer. “My life lacks all meaning. Lead me to truth.”
Shifting its mighty tentacles, and fixing the shark with one giant, baleful eye, the colossal squid pondered this scrawny young would-be acolyte.
“Truth will you find,” sayeth the Squid. “But first must you eat. Strong must he be, who seeks the One Way.”
“But what am I to eat, oh Wisest One?” asked the shark. “Our seas are depleted; the halibut are all but gone from the great ocean.”
“Halibut? Pshaw!” spat the Seer. “Cast your gaze to the surface, youngling – answers there will you find.”
Almost too weary to speak, the obedient shark looked up towards the distant surface of the sea.
A strange, mystical light reached him from far above, and a joyous sound as of newborn shark pups frolicking in the morning of their brood home.
Drawn upwards, the shark, faint from exhaustion and hunger, followed the light and the magical sound to the surface, where he beheld the most curious creatures he had ever seen.
Smaller than his fellow sharks, but very like them in shape – these happy, gill-less creatures leapt and splashed through the waves overhead, giggling and clicking with glee.
Entranced by their cetacean beauty, but half-mad with hunger, the shark was suddenly overcome by predatory lust. Summoning his last reserves of strength, he lunged far out of the water, emerging beneath one of the dolphin-like creatures as it leapt through the air; his jaws snapping shut around its slippery body, razor-sharp teeth penetrating slick grey flesh.
As the creature’s hot blood flowed down his gullet, and he ripped a first wet chunk of flesh from its side, he felt an extraordinary, euphoric wave sweep through his entire being. In a bloody haze, he devoured the entire animal, transcendently high on the rich, aromatic sweetness of its exotic meat.
Finally, blissfully dazed and sated, the shark lay back and sank, slowly, to the ocean’s floor; humming softly to himself as he descended to the lair of the Great Seer once more.
“Oh… maaaan!” cooed the shark. “Faaaar out, baby – that was, like, intense. Wow! What ever was that thing? Man, it was delicious! I’m never touching halibut again.”
“You see, young neophyte,” replied the mighty Squid. “If enlightenment you seek, do nothing just for the halibut – always must you strive for the higher porpoise.”
(I’m really sorry. It just came to me on the subway ride this morning, and I had to get it out of my head.)
@Tom – well, violence is sometimes the impetus for wake up, unfortunately. It wasn’t mine, but it was the author’s. I don’t advocate violence, but I also do not deny that it exists and that it is the reality of many.
Very well said. I totally agree. 100%. I may not come across here, in this post as thinking this out fully, but I really do live my life in fear that everything that is important will eventually be commercialized.
Your quote from the Maori is amazing. I love it.
RE: “Just want to bitch and call them names because you haven’t or can’t do this? Well, that gets no respect from me.
And Miss Rogue, how come THAT comment didn’t even hit your “mean guys” radar?”
I’m confused…which comment is that?
I only deleted 3 comments and that was because they were slightly childish, quite taunting and one even attacked another commenter for, a, perhaps, naive statement, but it was uncalled for.
I never delete comments because I disagree with them.
I agree…I just think that would be absolutely impossible, seeing that there are so many viewpoints in the world.
Personally, when I think of HP, I think of small problems I can solve…
I didn’t mean to dismiss ‘just some guy’ here. Without realizing how my comment would sound to readers, I was saying, “Sounds like you actually have a very strong HP, you are just denying it. Stop denying it!” But it did come across wrong now that I go back and read it…I responded to ‘just some guy’ after I read Chris L.’s comment, which totally threw me off. I totally didn’t mean to invoke anti-semitism. Not in a million years. After I read that, I raced through my comment on ‘just some guy’s entry so that I could respond to Chris. My bad.
I certainly didn’t mean to shame dump. I totally agree with you. I hate that, too. I also hate ‘you are shallow’ dumping, which, I think, is another manifestation of shame dumping, which is what the ‘mean comments’ were saying, but not in a “This sounds shallow” way. I don’t think I’m shallow. I live my life in agony over how I can please everyone else. It hurt me to have these guys, who I’ve seen attack others elsewhere, come around without knowing who I am and leave not so nice comments. If that makes me weak, then I am weak.
What does “Higher” mean to me? It means beyond survival. Beyond the day to day grind of life. Beyond my own little world. Beyond making a buck. “Higher” means things that positively affect those around me. Someone’s HP could definitely be their family and their kids…making a better life for them. But when making a better life for their children means that it hurts someone else and their children, that is not a Higher Purpose, that is self-promotion.
That’s where people like Hitler, the Communist dictators and other evil, but charismatic leaders twisted Higher Purpose to only benefit a small group of people like them. Unfortunately, they were able to lead people with that HP far enough to do alot of damage. There is a dark side to it. I have to figure out how to distinguish between ‘good’ and ‘evil’ without being narrow. You see, there are good Christians and good Buddhists and good Islams who have HP, but wouldn’t necessarily agree with one another on what that means.
Anyway. Yes. I agree with you. I sounded dismissive and I’m sorry to “just some guy” (I think I actually clarified it in my second response to him and we ended up having a decent exchange).
And, I didn’t say I have the answers. I’m figuring this stuff out, mostly for myself…outloud here.
Thanks for your amazing insight into this, Ev.
“In the living of it, the purpose unfolds.”
This totally nails it…
Hey Enric,
You are totally right. I’ve been thinking about how we can make the distinction between “Higher Purpose” and “Hurtful Purpose”.
I guess what I’m being sensitive to is that, in the case of GWB, there are alot of good people who believe(d) that his actions in Iraq were some divine message and, truly, the protection of America’s freedom. Myself, I think that is insane, but it gave 51% of the American voters something to believe in and get behind. Of course, now that people are realizing it wasn’t a HP at all, that it was the drive of a crazy man and it’s hurt alot of people (and totally destroyed an entire country), where are we?
I also think about the different religions and how they see HP. This faith is important to the followers of these religions and, in itself, doesn’t hurt others. The wars that follow. The persecution that follows in the name of HP, that hurts.
I need to think this through. Maybe the people in this forum, who seem to feel passionate about this subject can start to discuss this with me?
“I totally didn’t mean to invoke anti-semitism.”
Tara: nor did I think, even for a second, that you were doing that. I think you missed my point here from the very start. Let’s recap. You wrote about a book, Purpose, by Nikos Mourkogiannis, in which the author uses Henry Ford as an example — even going so far as to include a chapter titled “The Heroic Purpose of Henry Ford.” Now it seems this book has been widely praised in the business community (I supplied a link to the publisher’s page so everyone could read the glowing kudos). However, Henry Ford was not a hero, but rather a despicable racist coward who supported Hitler and supplied him with a rationale for what later became the Holocaust. I think these are salient facts that bear deeper scrutiny than this book has yet received. And they are especially relevant in light of the high-toned discussion of ethics, morality and capital-P Purpose — all of which your author goes into in some detail.
However, I was told several times that what I was saying had no relevance to this post. If you were unable to connect those dots, then I think you might be out of your depth broaching such complex issues. If you feel insulted by that comment, I can assure you it’s no less than I felt on being told to “take it elsewhere” and being compared to some dolt in a Monty Python skit. If people have seemed “mean” to you here, you might ask yourself where that started.
“Since Chris Locke’s essay mentions Kierkegaard…”
Excuse me, but Chris Locke said nothing whatsoever about Kierkegaard. Kierkegaard was, however, mentioned by Nikos Mourkogiannis — the author of the book under discussion here — in the link I supplied above:
http://www.purposethebook.com/aboutthebook/excerpt
If I haven’t already made it clear enough, I don’t *like* that author much, so would appreciate not having his words attributed to me. Attention to detail does help keep things a bit straighter in such exchanges.
“Where did Napoleon come into this? I’m confused.”
You surely are, Tara. He was mentioned in that quote I left here by the author of Purpose — the book you initially posted about, remember? That was the comment to which you replied:
“Ack. Got it. Your point is loud and clear, Chris.
Not anything to do with this conversation, but loud and clear.”
Your confusion about Napoleon proves that you had in fact not read what I wrote.
Sigh. Chris. I may be out of my element because these are the things I’m trying to juggle right now:
1. Being a business owner…swamped with client work
2. Being the mother of a very troubled teen
3. Having a gabillion conferences coming up and loads of research to complete
I didn’t misinterpret that you said I was anti-semitic. I understand that you found the author and the book I referred to as shallow and his references poor (and anti-semitic). I was over my head on that one because I: a. don’t know the history of Ford and b. I haven’t formed an opinion on the book. I actually said in my post that I haven’t finished reading it and I didn’t think it was a sufficient writing of what I was talking about.
The reason I agreed that you were off-topic is because my post wasn’t intended to be a review nor an endorsement of the book or his examples. I should definitely write another post or amend this one to reflect that if you think it was. Usually, I’m pretty clear in my endorsements.
As David W. pointed out, I was wrong in that assessment because, even though your points aren’t DIRECTLY on-topic with what my thesis is – Higher Purpose is important – my examples to support that thesis were questionnable, which are what you were pointing out…
Do I have it right?
Sorry I missed that his reference to Napoleon was a reference to yours…this thread has gone all over the place. (something like 76+ comments)
I’m afraid I’m not keeping up. Life is crazy for me this week. I read what you wrote…my inability to keep information straight between commenters is my shortcoming.
Like Higher Purposes, for example.
Exactly.
You think Hitler needed Ford? A citation would be helpful …
Web 2.0′s democratisation of media produces a wealth of new perspectives. Some of those formerly excluded from the public sphere have the chance to make their voices heard. But this wave of participation is as important for business as it is for the newly included. Mute’s Web 2.0 special uncovers the work in social networking and, behind the ‘dotcommunist’ spin, a centralisation of the means of sharing. Texts by Giorgio Agostoni, Olga Goriunova, Dmytri Kleiner & Brian Wyrick and Angela Mitropoulos. Additional articles by Brian Ashton, John Barker, Paul Helliwell and Merijn Oudenampsen
And here is the intro for the InfoEnclosure 2.0 article:
The hype surrounding Web 2.0′s ability to democratise content production obscures its centralisation of ownership and the means of sharing. Dmytri Kleiner & Brian Wyrick expose Web 2.0 as a venture capitalist’s paradise where investors pocket the value produced by unpaid users, ride on the technical innovations of the free software movement and kill off the decentralising potential of peer-to-peer production
http://www.metamute.org/en/InfoEnclosure-2.0
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Society of Ontario Freethinkers*
The God Who Wasn’t There*
Bowling for Columbine did it to the gun culture.
Super Size Me did it to fast food.
Now The God Who Wasn’t There does it to religion.
Holding modern Christianity up to a bright spotlight, this bold and often hilarious new film asks the questions few dare to ask.
Your guide through the world of Christendom is former fundamentalist Brian Flemming, joined by such luminaries as Jesus Seminar fellow Robert M. Price, professor Richard Dawkins, author Sam Harris and historian Richard Carrier.
See the movie the Los Angeles Times calls “provocative – to put it mildly.”
Hold on to your faith. It’s in for a bumpy ride.
Yes, there’s so much to say. Text is a double edged sword. It can thoughtfully express ideas that remains to many. On the other hand, text alone drops the dimensionality of presence, behavior, context of the person expressing. It’s interesting that we’ll probably not have such conversations in person. And in person we’ll now so much more about what someone else means.
Hi Evelyn,
Yes, you are right and correct to point out that I took the discussion of “higher purpose” slightly out of context to Tara’s original intentions. Surely she didn’t mean cosmic purpose; however, the cover image (ray of light enlightens lost lumberjack [note the cut tree branch]) help set the framing towards a spiritual interpretation of her prose. Reading between the lines, Tara appears to be saying she wants a better world and thinks making a business with that goal is one way of doing so. Certainly a lovely and worthy goal. But as euphoric as her epiphany might feel or sound, reality has a nasty way of actually being real and that quote about the road to hell comes to mind.
We’ve tried framing reality around religious dogma and spiritual metaphors for a long time now (perhaps 8,000 years); perhaps it is time to change?
Best,
Joey
“In Africa, they say there are two hungers, the lesser hunger and the greater hunger. The lesser hunger is for the things that sustain life, the goods and services, and the money to pay for them, which we all need. The greater hunger is for an answer to the question “why?”, for some understanding of what that life is for.” – “Hungry Spirit, Beyond Capitalism: A Quest for Purpose in the Modern World” by Charles Handy
Interesting, this quote starts “in Africa…” I think people across the planet everywhere wonder from time to time why should I get up tomorrow morning? For those reading THIS blog (not speaking for economies of world or even USA), I think we really do have the luxury of asking these deeper questions.
For some their children are the driver and motivation for “why” as reenacted in the movie, “The Pursuit of Happyness”. And I must say for my own parents whom immigrated from Cuba that was their motivation too, some variation of: “a better life for their kids.” Even with mouths to feed, there certainly are situations even in the so-called 1st world of suicide among parents. The greater hunger lies unfulfilled for many, many people.
I think there is SOMETHING that motivates us to act and go on with life, whether we want to call it motivation, beliefs, values, purpose, inspiration, etc.
That WHY is an individual, personal question that takes integrity (playing off Joey’s use of honesty, really loved what he shared) to answer over and over for ourselves. I thought when I started my serious quest for “what is my purpose” after the dot-com bust closed the company and after my divorce that finding that one tidy packaged answer would provide the impetus for me to have the passion and will to go run with IT, whatever IT was.
I think maybe some people take offense at the term “higher purpose” because that has a way of easily becoming “Eureka, I have THE answer!!” AND I’m looking for converts!” (I believe the question is so personal, and you couldn’t possibly just hand it to others.) With HP, it’s too easy for our egos to get embroiled and aim for world salvation and somehow end up down the road to world domination.
That’s why I think integrity is important. Integrity with the question.
Carlos Castaneda urges, “Before you embark on any path ask the question: Does this path have a heart? If the answer is no, you will know it, and then you must choose another path. The trouble is nobody asks the question…”
After 5 years seriously turning over that question, What is MY purpose?, I have a general aim/direction and hypothesis. The question is an open-ended moment-by-moment exploration. I think maybe that’s why Gandhi called his life an experiment with truth.
So another point of contention that some maybe having is HP can also become fixed, fixated – in any answer, and that can be dangerous too. To leave it open-ended allows room for growth and being informed by life.
So maybe Higher Purpose isn’t quite the term to use. But I think Tara hit something genuine here. Really, so many of us reading here have so much to share. For me, and I think because I’ve met Tara, she may be saying the same thing, I think there are two kinds of people: those that act from shared interests, and those that will. It’s gotten really hard for me to be enthused to work with people, companies, institutions that are only about self-preservation. Well, more in ‘kindling’, and here’s some food for thought written by a friend of mine that takes philanthropists to Africa for their safari vacations plus adds in time for them to work hand-in-hand alongside communities and people on humanitarian projects (going beyond checkbook charity and making it about face time with the projects and people).
The Wisdom Of Sharing Stone Soup
There are many variations on the story of stone soup, but they all involve a traveler coming into a town. The inhabitants try to discourage the traveler from staying, fearing he wants them to give him food. They tell him in no uncertain terms that there’s no food anywhere to be found. The traveler explains that he doesn’t need any food and that, in fact, he was planning to make a soup to share with all of them. The villagers watch suspiciously as he builds a fire and fills a cauldron with water.
With great ceremony, he pulls a stone from a bag, dropping the stone into the pot of water. He sniffs the brew extravagantly and exclaims how delicious stone soup is. As the villagers begin to show interest, he mentions how good the soup would be with just a little cabbage in it. A villager brings out a cabbage to share. This episode repeats itself until the soup has cabbage, carrots, onions, and beets-indeed, a substantial soup that feeds everyone in the village.
This story addresses the human tendency to hoard in times of deprivation. When resources are scarce, we pull back and put all of our energy into self-preservation. We isolate ourselves and shut out others. As the story of stone soup reveals, in doing so, we often deprive ourselves and everyone else of a feast.
This metaphor plays out beyond the realm of food. We hoard ideas, love, and energy, thinking we will be richer if we keep to them to ourselves, when in truth we make the world, and ourselves, poorer whenever we greedily stockpile our reserves. The traveler was able to see that the villagers were holding back, and he had the genius to draw them out and inspire them to give, thus creating a spread that none of them could have created alone.
Are you like one of the villagers, holding back? If you come forward and share your gifts, you will inspire others to do the same. The reward is a banquet that can nourish many. – by David Chamberlain,
“The Wisdom Of Sharing Stone Soup”, Exquisite Safaris
Oops, the URL for the “Kindling” post on shared interests was left out above.
The mother of a troubled teen spending how many hours replying to messages on an internet forum?
Juggling clients, research and how many excuses?
Someone needs their priorities readjusted. I wouldn’t mind betting you spend less than one hour a week doing things with your teenager which they enjoy doing but many more hours fighting and arguing and wishing they’d sort themselves out so you could get back to those important things like clients, research(!) and internet forums.
Ever stop to ask what it’s all for?
The comment that markets are mindless things that grind us all up, as if making a living is some kind of karmic crime …
No people, no markets, so if markets are mindless then so too are people.
That’s what I call a mean comment.
Not only that, if enough people actually believe it, it has disastrous consequences, so it’s perniciously evil not only in intent but in its effects.
And you asked if your butt was lookin big!
Personally, my answer was the closest to philosophy I’ve ever managed. I’m seriously bummed it’s been erased …
Perhaps it wasn’t “fit for purpose” …
The interesting thing is that Open Source appears to resolve the micro vs. macro economics perspective.
— Enric
Tara, I’d be a whole lot more comfortable were not smiley faces used in discussions about very troubled teens, Hitler and Kierkegaard.
Henry Ford, that’s okay.
Higher purpose…
I can’t rememember anywhere that I have read more about an ethereal non-sensical and meaningless concept and still come away with the feeling that nobody knows what on earth they’re talking about.
Higher Purpose… whose purpose, what purpose, higher than what purpose, what is a lower purpose?
The key aspect of our language is definition. Without definition, there is no meaning. If anyone is going to talk about a higher purpose, then I’m going to suggest they’re barking out of the wrong hole unless they first offer a definition of exactly what higher purpose is.
To want to do good, without reward or recognition, is closer to higher purpose than anything else. I’m sure your RSS Reader will be quite special. I’m sure you will not know how much.