The end or the means?

Today Shakespeare really irritated me. 'All is well that ends well'. He picked such an inane platitude as a title for his play. By that yardstick everything in the world is rendered meaningless because everything- and everyone - actually ends! The end should not be an issue at all for it is the path, the journey, the process, and how you go about it that matters. And just as it is the living that is important not the dying, so also it is the means to an end that is the all-in-all, and the aim is quite immaterial.

Ancient wisdom has always guided us to live in the moment and not think of what is to come. This does not mean 'live it up now' and everything else be damned. It simply means that one must live each moment in the best possible way. The Gita says that 'the fruits of work should not be your motive'. The end result should not be our concern, for it is the doing of our duty that defines us. Our duty as friend, spouse, sibling child, fellow human.

If it is the aim to be a doctor, it is a poor, sick choice. If it is the process of healing, the living as a doctor that matters, then you have got it right. If you are going through the grind of college for that degree, seriously, it is not worth it. The 'grind' of education is exactly what should have meaning for you, or there will never be any learning involved.

Finally, and completely, it is only the doing that matters. What and how it is done. Steve Jobs gave us some wonderful iPhones. Great goal, good result of course ( I am an Apple fan). A month before the launch of the first iPhone, he insisted on changing the cover from plastic to something 'unscratchable' . Wonderful idea, most certainly. But waking up scores of young Chinese workers in the middle of night and handing them a cup of coffee and a biscuit for a mandatory 12-hour shift is simply not the right way to go about it. Does it make getting the right product ready at the right time worth it? No one with a head that works will say yes. They say success comes naturally to those who do what they love doing. But that is not enough. I believe what you love doing should also be done right.

It brings me to a related saying 'the ends justify the means'. So, if the end is good, whatever the means are applied to that 'good end' are acceptable? In what kind of perverted universe would that be fair? Can you go about lashing people so that they learn how to behave? Can draconian laws be in place because they offer security? Or you can bribe your way to a public office because you will be doing more good in that position?

Going about things the wrong way, morally, ethically or legally, can never, ever be justified. Period. The world is not worth saving if even one person has be hurt intentionally for it. We have enough pain going about in the world without people starting to use silly phrases likes 'the ends justify the means' to add to it. For any noble end, the means have to be equally noble.

The conservatives in the US want to prevent abortions. Though personally I cannot fathom how anyone has the dimwitted meanness to make a public issue of such a personal decision, even the end of saving a "life" has been made into a disgusting joke because the means they are adopting. Forcing women to undergo invasive unnecessary procedures is just a little less bad than legislating away their right to choose to terminate a pregnancy.

 All is not well just because it ends well; all is only well when all is well- that means from beginning to end.