Looking for the meaning of life!
Through discreet channels, I found out that the “brand eins” of October will deal with the “Meaning” as a focal theme.
🙂 Well, that shows I was right after all:
More and more, “brand eins” turns into an economical-philosophical magazine.
When thinking about “the meaning”, I remember the following anecdote out of my life:
In the 1980ies, yours truly and some friends went to a week-long seminar of Rupert Lay in Africa every other year..
When, once again, the time had come, I, together with George Brooke, was in the middle of some rather intense work on the project “Collage” – a window manager for SINIX and special “thin clients”. Or, as you called it at the time: window technology on graphics screens using simple end devices.
At the time, I regularly took lunch in the Siemens canteen with George. A few days before my departure, we talked about my trip to Africa. He wanted to know what I was going to do for more than a week in Kenia.
I told him about my seminars with Rupert Lay. That they were about management and leadership. But also about personal development. And that these seminars always also helped me towards finding the meaning of my own life.
That was something he could not entirely understand, because he was (and still is) a very functional technocrat and rationally controlled British Gentleman. He asked me about the theme of the current seminar.
My reply was:
Hi George, it’s about the “meaning of life”
My words had dire consequences. George had just put a huge forkful of spaghetti into his mouth. And suddenly he had a fit of laughter – you can easily imagine what followed …
When he was again halfway capable of talking and had cleaned his jacket as good as possible, he told me why he had the fit of laughter:
He remembered “The Meaning of Life” by Monty Python.
That is how I first took note of the one film I still hold to be one of the best on “the meaning of life”. I can hardly think of another that brings enlightenment to the various problems concerning the meaning of life in an equally diverse and at the same time humorous way.
My children, too, are still enthusiastic about the film, even though they wonder why they all had to/were permitted to watch the film so early in their lives. They think it is not a bad – if somewhat strange – way of handing down values.
RMD
(Translated by EG)
P.S.
Incidentally, on this African trip, we were accompanied by the ZDF with Wolfgang Herles and a camera man. I still have an inofficial video recording done by the ZDF and, of course, the short report as broadcast.
And here it is again, the exciting question: May I publish those two films in Youtube? Or will I have to get all kinds of permissions? There is no doubt that this would eventually result in a denial… So: Shall we risk it????
But first: here is the music and the introduction to the brilliant film. And my heartfelt greetings and many thanks to George who today is back in good old England!
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