Jane Goodall And The Value of Commitment

​Seth Godin recently wrote: “Our biggest commitments, the things we are most dedicated to, rarely pay us back in equal measure. That might be the point.”

I couldn’t help but think of those words as I reflected on Jane Goodall’s passing. Goodall devoted her life to the chimpanzees of Gombe, and to the larger cause of conservation and compassion for the natural world. It’s difficult to imagine a more lopsided exchange. She poured in decades of her life, enduring isolation, hardship, criticism, and the relentless grind of advocacy. What did she receive in return?

Certainly not wealth in the conventional sense, nor a life of ease.

But maybe this is the kind of commitment Godin was pointing toward. The point was never about a balanced ledger. Goodall didn’t enter the forest with her eyes and heart on dollar signs, she entered with curiosity and stayed with conviction and commitment.

The return she received was something deeper that wealth: the joy of discovery, the widening of human understanding, and the quiet assurance that her life mattered beyond herself.

Does money ever really assure us that our lives matter? Is there any form of wealth greater than having that assurance?

That’s often the paradox of our greatest commitments. They don’t pay us back in equal measure because they’re NOT supposed to. Parenting, faith, teaching, healing, conservation, the scales never balance. But in the imbalance, we discover meaning. In the one-sidedness, we become more fully human.

I do believe the world needs more of that imbalance these days. To me, we feel sadly less fully human than ever.

Goodall’s life reminds us that chasing after equal return is the wrong question. The right one is: What will I so fully give myself to that the return becomes irrelevant? Because the measure of our lives isn’t found in what we accumulate but in what we dedicate ourselves to.

Ms. Goodall seemed to fully get what Godin was saying: The fact that our commitments don’t pay us back in equal measure isn’t a flaw. It’s the point.