"Seldom have I known any profound being that had anything to say to this world, unless forced to stammer out something by way of getting a living." (from Moby Dick)
I'm posting because this is an assignment and I'm a dutiful student – not b/c I fancy myself, in deed or aspiration, a profound being.
I feel bad for Karl.
Much of what Niall did/experience strikes me as pablum. It might be that so much of it was in the service of bath soap. I'm a snob, to be sure, and I don't like Unilever (isn't it the green and white one?).
More bothersome is the implied twist on the Coolidge adage that would go like this: "The business of business is taking care of one's self." I agree this mindfulness and marathon running is part of the equation, but I'm also a little bothered by how generally well-cared for (fit, rested, happy) business executives and school administrators are compared to the salespeople and teachers who work for them.
I'm still waiting to see what resonant leadership looks like that isn't registered principally by a company's bottom line and/or in the personal health and vitality of said leader(s).
Interesting perspective, Jonathan. Perhaps a non-fiction text cannot get at the subtlety of human experience the way a novel can? That is the thing I love about reading fiction--it allows us to see the world through the eyes of humans struggling to get through their journey, their day, a moment. So, sometimes, these more functional books seem trivial in comparison. I know that wasn't your point, per se, but after reading the Moby Dick quote, I thought back to an essay prompt you have used with students (and that I once borrowed): "Locate a vein. Trace it to the heart." Your opening quote did that in a way. While this book may not be that deep, this kind of reading helps me to stop and check my own behavior. At the heart of it all is the human experience and our failings at meeting our own needs and others'. The business world does seem a bit less meaningful than our schools on one level, but I do find that it's easy to fall into the administrative hamster wheel of responding to email, meetings, managing a small crisis and then starting all over again without taking the time to check in with self and others. Perhaps we are just stumbling through our days, but to do so more thoughtfully and coherently is a goal. Certainly, more to discuss when we are together.
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