Inigo Montoya and The Dark Side of Singleminded Purpose
Posted on August 30, 2010 by LJ Earnest
Categories: Productivity
Mondays are productivity days at SimpleProductivity blog.
One of my favorite movies, The Princess Bride
“My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.”
Inigo has had a single purpose since a child: to find the man who killed his father and left him with two scars, and kill him. In pursuit of that goal, he has learned to be an amazing sword fighter, and traveled the world seeking the six-fingered man who killed his father.
Talk about a life purpose.
Even in the midst of drunken stupors, he remembers. Even when bleeding from multiple wounds, he remembers, and it spurs him on, giving him strength and focus.
And then it is accomplished. The six-fingered man is dead.
As I was watching the movie recently, I was left wondering two questions: What Has Inigo Missed? and What Will He Do Now?
It seems to me that in his single-minded pursuit of his goal, Inigo has cut himself off from other life experiences. Sure, he has traveled, but he spent the time looking for the six-fingered man. Did he really experience what was offered to him? I doubt it.
And then when the six-fingered man is dead, Inigo is left at loose ends. What will he do? His whole life has been spent in pursuit of one goal, and once the goal was accomplished, he had no other things to fall back on. Sure, he could spend the rest of his days drifting from assignment to assignment as a hired blade. Or perhaps he could become the Dread Pirate Roberts. But there is nothing planned.
I think there is are productivity lessons to be learned here: do not allow your goals to cut you off from experiencing your life; and always have a plan of what to do next.
Photo by floodllama
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Comments (2)
I agree. And don’t be afraid to modify goals or even drop them altogether. Life changes; we change. Sometimes a goal we set at some point in the past seemed like a good idea at the time, but it may not be meaningful or purposeful today.
I also find that I look at goals and (often) have a “what on EARTH was I thinking?” If I didn’t take time to reassess I would end up doing a lot (more) pointless stuff.