My partner came up with an interesting party game recently. A couple of drinks into the evening, when everyone has shed the week’s stress a little bit, we gather everyone around and ask — “so what’s the most controversial opinion you hold?” The rules of the game are a, be truthful, and b, annoy at least some people in the room. In the different groups we’ve played the game in, opinions have ranged from “marriages are an outdated institution” (friends in Bombay rolled their eyes but fairly controversial in a family group in Chandigarh) to “reservations for women hurt feminism” (led to the fiercest arguments so far). My contribution — “incest among consenting adults is okay” — which I thought would break all records, caused only mild discomfort, maybe because GoT already made the idea mainstream.
I have one more controversial opinion but I’ve been afraid to say it out loud because I think I’ll lose all my best friends if I do. I’ve been dwelling on it for months but it is so disconcerting it has stayed in my journal. I feel ready to risk it today, so here it is: the whole philosophy of a purpose-driven life is not only wrong but also harmful all around.
Parents, poetry, other sources of inspiration — they all encourage us to answer these questions as we navigate our life maps: What is your purpose? What are you passionate about? What is your legacy going to be? Articulating your purpose is the first step in the journey of a meaningful life and career. It’s the first step towards moving people, towards being successful. Those of us who work in the impact sector think about this all the time, and for-profit folks articulate it too. “What is your brand’s purpose?” is what they’re all asking now, from Facebook to Starbucks.
Why do I think this idea of purpose is poisonous? Because the parents, poetry, the coaches that encourage us to find and follow our passion also urge us to do it all cost. At the cost of our selves, at the cost of other people’s comfort (and their purpose), at the cost of the planet. How much do you care about this dream of yours? Do you care about it enough to die for it? Do you care about it enough to kill for it? Alright then, you’re the hero we’ll write about in poems and in lists of Most Influential People of the century. With billions of us buying into the narrative and setting out to fulfill our purpose, it was inevitable that we destroyed lives and climate.
I guess what I’m saying is this: all purpose-driven people cause harm. Even the people with meaningful goals — educating children, eradicating tuberculosis, protecting refugees. If this seems like a hyperbola, I have examples to prove my point:
- The CEO of a healthcare non-profit that saves hundreds of lives takes four long haul flights each month, generating more annual carbon emissions than five hundred people.
- The founder of an NGO working to educate children in the poorest parts of India works 18-hour days, has sick parents and crippling anxiety but has neither time nor money to seek care.
These people may be causing net harm, but they are our heroes because they’re fulfilling their purpose at all costs. Still seems hyperbolic? Here is what my idea looks like upside down, and may be slightly easier to swallow: all harm is caused by someone fulfilling their purpose. Every bit of damage in this world is collateral damage from someone just looking to build their legacy. It’s a matter of perspective. Examples:
- The CSR head who refused to fund urgent medicines? She was protecting her career and her dream of bringing financially stability to her family.
- The oil company destroying forests? The CEO is passionate about making his father proud, to build the world’s largest oil company and creating thousands of jobs.
- The board of directors who cut employee benefits? They were simply fulfilling their promise to the shareholders who trusted them with investments.
- Arms dealers? Mafia? They too are building financial security for loved ones (once, at a campsite in Sydney, I actually met a guy who had worked at an ammunition factory for thirty years. He was a very sweet old man, very affectionate towards his frail wife).
- The soldier who shot at children? The president who turned refugees away? Nineteenth century plantation owners? They were protecting their country; their purpose was to build resilient, independent and prosperous nations for their people.
These people are someone’s heroes too. Because remember what we were told? Follow your life’s purpose with passion and disregard the costs. We’re all trying to do exactly that. No one builds their life around a dream of hurting people (not even the wall street dudes, not even the murdering dictators — even though it is a mind-bending exercise to see this). And yet, we all cause different degrees of harm as we navigate through our purpose-driven journeys. Measuring the degree of harm is entirely subjective. Some purpose projects are loftier and more conducive to self-righteousness, but it is all perspective, depending on the type of privilege that shaped the way we think. Sometimes the biggest harm is to ourselves: trapped in the prisons of our purpose, fighting the injustice that needs to be fought since no one else seems to care, we become blind to the beauty that surrounds us, and deaf to our own cries for help.
As we continue to do the work we need to do — expanding justice, reversing climate change, improving health access — perhaps we also need to think about resetting the purpose narrative? Maybe we could learn to celebrate lives who first prioritize kindness (towards the planet, towards inhabitants of the planet), and only then chase their passion, as meaningful as it may be? Can those people be our real heroes — the ones who practise joy, generosity and humility at the cost of their life’s work? But that description of a hero sounds dull, even to me. We’re a species that evolved because our DNA runs on dopamine and serotonin. Without passion projects, where would we get dopamine and serotonin from? We’ll probably go on the way we are, fulfilling our destinies, causing damage left, right and center, convinced that it is other selfish people whose actions are creating havoc. Until it all comes to an end.
