From Survival to Significance
The infinite human desire to feel significant is the root cause of most conflicts
LAKSHMI IS THE GODDESS OF WEALTH WHO HOLDS IN HER hand a pot. Pots are not natural; they are man made. The presence of pots indicates the presence of humanity. The pot holds a special place in human imagination because a pot changes humanity’s relationship with nature. Once water moves from a water body into a pot, it stops being everyone’s water. It now belongs to the person who owns the pot. Water in a pot has an owner. The pot enables humans to turn natural resources into personal property.
Property is a human idea, an artificial construction, not a natural phenomenon. Animals do not own nature. Animals have territory that they defend with brute force. But when another animal lays claim to its territory and it is unable to fight back, there is no court where an animal can go to appeal. There are no courts in nature; no law except might is right, survival of the fittest. Animals need territory in order to survive – to get access to food. Animals do not create territory for self-actualisation. Herein is the difference between animal and humans, territory and property, water in the river and water in a pot, food in a tree and food in a basket. Humans need property not just to survive; humans need property in order to feel significant.
All living organisms die. Only humans introspect about death and wonder then about the point of life. Property gives humans a reason to live and it allows humans to defy mortality. “I may die, but my pot will outlive me.” Thus property gives human life a meaning; it validates existence.
When one says, that the purpose of the organisation is to generate wealth – we are not simply referring to the human need to survive, we are referring to the human need for significance. There is enough wealth around to pull people out of poverty but there is never enough wealth to make people feel significant. For the human desire to feel significant is infinite. And this is the source of most conflicts.
Nagarjuna P. Raja built a hotel in a small town. The hotel was highly successful. It generated a lot of wealth. Now, he has appointed a manager to run the hotel so that he can achieve his lifelong dream of retiring in peace and enjoying his wealth, and not bother with its generation.
Unfortunately, every time he visits the hotel he finds something wrong. The manager, he feels, is not doing his job. This leads to arguments. The manager is exasperated. He tries to explain to Mr. Raja that he must be allowed to take a call to run the show but Mr. Raja keeps interfering. This is a classic conflict between the proprietor and the professional. Arguments are often logical but the cause of the conflict has nothing to do with logic; it is emotional.
What the manager and Mr. Raja do not realise is that the hotel is Mr. Raja’s pot. It is not only merely the source of money, it is about Mr. Raja’s sense of significance. When seems like a fight between Mr. Raja and the manager over the best way to manage the hotel, is actually Mr. Raja’s fight for his significance. If he remains indifferent to the running of the hotel, he feels invalidated. But in interfering with the hotel, he invalidates the manager. And so the two fight as two animals fight over territory. Only here they are not fighting for survival. They are fighting for significance.
While animals are clear why they are fighting, humans are not. The desire to feel significant is never a stated goal. It is an unconscious need. The hotel defines Mr. Raja’s image of himself. It justifies his existence on earth, makes him feel he has done something with his life. Letting it into the hands of a manager seems logical, but he needs to remind himself, and the manager, constantly that it is his, and only his, pot. So long as this desire for significance is not acknowledged, the fight between Mr. Raja and the manager will never end.
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