Lost Purposes

I don’t usually do articles that just link to and comment on other people’s articles, but in this case I’ll make an exception, for this rather provocative article: “Lost Purposes”.

I have to disagree with the author about one thing, though.  He claims that individuals are better than bureaucracies because we can keep track of our purposes.  But the truth is that our minds are also bureaucracies, sometimes, and we find ourselves marching to the rules and rewards set for us in childhood, long after we’ve become adults or middle-aged or even older.

The good thing, however, about individuals is that we are at least capable of noticing that we’re doing this.  Organizations can’t notice things, but people can.