Five False Purposes

We need a sense of purpose. A sense of purpose is crucial for humans who wander in the face of the enormous question, "How should I live my life?" It provides direction and meaning.

Most of us face a common adversity: after 12 years of school education, whether we go to university or not, we are thrown into the professional world. Until now, we only needed to follow a set path and complete assigned tasks. Suddenly, the moment comes when we have to make all the choices and take responsibility for everything. We haven't been trained for that.

According to Robert Greene's The Laws of Human Nature, the way to overcome this confusion is having a sense of purpose. It's the direction for how to live our lives. A very important keyword.

False Purposes

Having a sense of purpose is extremely important for living as the main character of our own lives. We need to understand what gives us meaning, what drives us, and what we pursue to live a life that truly reflects who we are. This way, we won't be swept away by our surroundings.

The problem is that there are fake senses of purpose in the world. In other words, the driving forces that move us and the directions we want to live in can sometimes be fake. We might mistake these fake senses of purpose for the real ones and end up pursuing the wrong things.

We fall into the trap of fake senses of purpose because many people want to create purposes cheaply. They try to find the purpose of their lives in the easiest and most convenient way with minimal effort, without deep reflection and contemplation about themselves.

In this article, I will introduce five false purposes that Robert Greene presents in his book.

Pursuit of Pleasure

This is probably the most common fake purpose. We are naturally drawn to superficial pleasures and can even become addicted to them. Examples include stimulants, food, shopping, gambling, and all sorts of games.

However, whatever the target of pursuit, these lead to the law of diminishing marginal utility. In other words, the pleasure we get from them decreases the more we repeat them. Personally, I don't think superficial pleasures are bad, but if you blindly chase them to the point where they become your sense of purpose, they soon turn into addictions, and you end up depending on them.

Causes and Cults

Humans have an inherent desire to believe in something. When there isn't a grand belief system that unites us, all sorts of trivial causes and cults fill that void. These groups not only become outlets for people's personal frustrations, jealousy, and hatred but also make them feel a sense of superiority as if they are part of a special group that knows the truth.

You’ve probably seen people with these false beliefs either directly or indirectly. I’ve met such people myself, and the biggest characteristic I’ve noticed is that they perceive their beliefs as masters over them. In other words, it's not that they own their beliefs, but their beliefs own them. This traps them in closed-minded thinking within those ideologies. Anyone who opposes their beliefs is automatically wrong or evil.

People in crowds are easily influenced by others. When among a crowd, individuals may feel they bear no personal responsibility, leading to violence and irrational behavior. According to Gustave Le Bon, if you hold a certain belief, you must reflect on whether it came from deep personal contemplation or if it's merely a fake sense of purpose.

Money and Success

This is personally the most ambiguous part. Many people see making a lot of money and achieving high status as major motivations and the focus of their lives. Is this so wrong? I don't particularly think so.

The problem, however, is that as Robert Greene mentions in his book, many who pursue money and success believe that "finding a life’s calling (sense of purpose) is a waste of time." People trapped in this fallacy often enter fields where they can make the most money quickly. Their only criterion for choosing a job is money, which is why they enter areas that have little to do with their actual interests or values. They also fail to find meaning in their work.

Moreover, the motivation for pursuing these things is often just to feel superior by having more money and status than others. But with such standards, it's hard to know when you have enough because there will always be someone who has more.

Attention

Most people have always sought fame and attention. They want to feel like they are important and significant, and this has been greatly popularized by social media in modern times. Now, anyone can receive the level of attention that only kings or conquerors could dream of in the past.

As a result, our self-image and self-esteem become linked to the attention we receive through social media, which is a big problem. When the attention we receive about ourselves decreases, painful suffering ensues. We start to worry about what we're doing wrong, why people have lost interest in us, and so on. In the end, it eats away at us.

Cynicism

Robert Greene describes cynicism as "using emptiness as a purpose." Especially nowadays, more people are feeling disillusioned with politics and past values, making cynicism a more common fake sense of purpose. For example:

"Standards for truth and meaning are outdated. All politicians are corrupt, so it's not worth participating in politics, and it's better to abstain from voting or deliberately choose leaders who will ruin everything. Successful people have manipulated the system to get where they are. Reality is so bleak that it's better to accept it and become skeptical. Nothing in the world is serious, so we should just laugh off everything."

People with this attitude act as if it's cool and stylish. Cynics exude a blasé and mocking demeanor to appear as if they understand everything.

However, the true nature of cynicism is childish fear. It's merely an attempt to hide the fear of trying something and failing or becoming a laughingstock. To borrow Robert Greene’s words, cynicism "stems purely from laziness and offers no consolation to those who believe in it for having achieved nothing."

These are the five fake senses of purpose presented in The Laws of Human Nature: pursuit of pleasure, causes and cults, money and success, attention, and cynicism. What Greene is saying is that if any of these apply to you, you are currently pursuing something wrong. You have fallen into the trap of seeking a sense of purpose too easily. I am the same way.

I hope you can think a little deeper and more about yourself to find a true sense of purpose. How about you? What sense of purpose do you have in your life right now? How did you come to have that sense of purpose?