Reading time: 2 – 2 minutes

Motivation and Inspiration from the Animal Kingdom

As I recall, the novel Jonathan Livingston Seagull was a huge hit when it was first published in the 1970’s. If you haven’t read the book, it’s about a seagull who breaks away from the mundane scavenging life of the flock to learn to really fly so that he can be truly free. He’s rejected by the flock, but follows his calling and finds a form of transcendence. Apparently the book was life-changing for some people.

Another very successful book featuring an animal metaphor was Who Moved My Cheese? This featured two mice, one of whom coped with change a lot better than the other. It’s popular in corporate circles, and I even received a copy as part of the severance pack when I was ‘let go’ from a job some years ago – how wonderful it was to have such a caring employer!

These two books share the common characteristic that they are very, very short – you can read either of them in half an hour or less. They’re also very suitable for children, who can enjoy them on a more superficial level (maybe a bit like The Simpsons? No, on second thoughts…)

If you read either of these books, what did you think? Deep and meaningful, or lightweight and superficial? Did other fictional animal stories inspire you, and should The Lion King be used to on the curriculum in philosophy courses?

Do let me have your comments.

Regards
Chris

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 18th, 2007 at 6:49 am and is filed under Motivation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.