Waiting for Godot: Research as Finding Life’s Search

Dr Brainerd Prince

The act of searching is not new to humans, even if we have come a long way from our ancestors who literally moved from one place to another searching and hunting for food and shelter. Today most of our search is virtual and we call it ‘googling’. 

There appears to be two reasons why we search – either because we have lost something that needs to be found, or, more often than not, we search to find out what it is that is out there that might enhance our lives. In the first case, it is not really a search, in the sense, we know exactly what it is that we are looking for, perhaps a little boy lost in the park, or a shirt in the closet. We have misplaced the item or the person has wandered off. Once this object or person that is eluding our vision comes into our sight, our search ends abruptly. There is absolutely nothing new that one gets in this search. Most of us humans, for most times, in the name of productive searching are but rectifying our carelessness and busy finding what we have lost in the first place. 

The second kind of search is very different from the first. It has a sense of the unknown, as it is not searching for something that is lost, but for something that is new and not yet in our grasp. However, even this search can be of two types. 

The first type is when one knows what one is looking for, even if one does not know exactly what one wants. Let me illustrate: Someone is looking to buy a red lipstick; however, she is completely uncertain about the exact shade or the brand of lipstick that she can possibly get within the budget she has set aside for it. It could be a lipstick to buy, a car to buy, a course to study, a dish to eat, or a club to visit. 

In each of these cases, in general, we know what we want; however, in specific, we are looking to find that which would be the perfect fit. Today’s ‘googling’ serves this purpose excellently by providing the various alternatives to such a search. Even here, one could say that there is no real search, as one has already determined in advance what one wants. It is merely a matter of specifying and clarifying what one wants. 

The second type of searching for the unknown is probably where our answer lies. I am referring to an existential unrest that we humans nurture deep within ourselves, that we don’t even understand or can easily explain. 

Have you at times had the feeling that you are deeply inadequate or empty? And when you try to imagine ways to fulfil the emptiness, nothing seems adequate enough. When you are experiencing this unrest, you play out in your head different options that will satisfy the unrest, but all of them fall away as superficial. You know that they do not have the gravitas and ‘the substance’ necessary to fulfil this unrest. This primordial unrest doesn’t seem to go away with any number of alternatives you provide. It is at this moment that one could say that you are undergoing an existential search – a search for yourself more than anything else, even as you try to identify the thirst itself that needs to be fulfilled.

I am reminded of Samuel Beckett’s iconic play Waiting for Godot, which has been voted as the ‘most significant English language play of the 20th century’. The play revolves around its two main characters, Vladimir and Estragon. While Estragon is inert and primarily concerned about the practical things of life, like his boots and chicken bones, Vladimir is restless and given to philosophical ruminations. The frustratingly aimless talks between these two rubs on us, their readers, making us equally frustrated and restless. 

And it does not get any better in Act Two. Vivian Mercier, the Irish literary critic, is remembered best for his famous summation of Beckett’s play. He states that the play ‘has achieved a theoretical impossibility – aplay in which nothing happens, that yet keeps audiences glued to their seats. What's more, since the second act is a subtly different reprise of the first, he has written a play in which nothing happens, twice’ (The Irish Times, 18 February 1956, p. 6.). 

And yet, in all this irritating aimlessness, there is one thing that keeps the plot going forward, which is, waiting for the never appearing Godot. When both these characters wanted to loiter off the stage, Pozzo a minor character, reminds them, ‘what happens in that case to your appointmentwith this . . . Godet . . . Godot . . . Godin . . . anyhow you seewho I mean, who has your future in his hands . . . (pause) . . . atleast your immediate future?’ The entire aimless play is held together by a waiting for, a searching for, Godot, who is the symbol of everything and nothing all at once. Godot could symbolize death, God, meaning or essence of life, and a power-centre – all at the same time.

The existential angst or frustrating aimlessness of life only finds its meaning in this search for something that might give purpose to the otherwise bland pursuit of nothingness. And as Pozzo says, it is Godot who has their future in his hands. Without Godot there is no future! This is what Vladimir and Estragon experience. 

It is this experience of a waiting or a searching that I would like to term as an authentic search, precisely because it does not even know what it is seeking after. And yet, it reflects the deep sense of restlessness inside us that propels us to search beyond us. I believe we can go beyond Beckett’s Vladimir and Estragon. While they don’t find Godot, but because the Play ends with them never knowing who Godot is, I believe we can do better than that. Let me put forward a three-part pathway for discovering the ‘Godots’ of our life.

Firstly, one needs to cultivate the practice of deeply listening in every experience, to discover our ‘Godot’, in whose hands our future lies. We, on our own, don’t know and we will never know who Godot is, because, Godot has to first find us! This search, therefore, begins with a true openness to listen and discover who Godot is for us, for whom we are waiting and searching. 

Secondly, Godot is not something that is purely external to us or something that is only within us. Godot lies at the intersection of both the within and the without. What I mean is that there must be an inner resonance with what we externally experience. It is at the conjoining of the inner with the external that confirms our Godot. Godot is only a name for what is already within us, and yet waiting to be revealed in our experience of the world. Simply put, it is that which captivates us and makes us immovable; or makes us stop life’s aimless wander; or that which holds our future in its hands. 

Finally, it is the self’s identification with its ‘Godot’ that articulates one’s authentic search in the world and in doing so, one establishes one’s place in the world. Unfortunately, this luxury was not available to both Vladimir and Estragon. Perhaps the reason why Godot never appears in the Play is a way of Beckett giving a commentary on life, and how most humans – and, probably for him, all humans – live without even the knowledge of their Godot, thus living aimlessly frustrating lives. For most humans, deep has not yet called out to deep. 

But for those like yourself, perhaps there has been a strange identification with the Godot of your life, the one that holds your future. It beckoned you with its appearance, and it’s bursting into your horizon. It beckoned the deep within you, the deep that was already waiting for a thousand years.

In finding that purpose, the quest, your Godot, you embark on your journey of discovery. As life goes on, there will be other Godots who will bring further clarifications and even modifications to this first appearance. But perhaps, this first appearance can be seen as a rite of passage when we have realized the higher call of the human life.

For those of us who are on a professional or academic research journey, this discovery of one’s Godot could serve as a great foundation for one’s research. And yet it is always more than that. It is in the discovery of this search that you find yourself, your meaning and purpose, and the very raison d'être of life. The search has found you and it has a name, a theme, that holds your future in its hands.

Dr. Brainerd Prince teaches and tutors students on academic and research skills. He consults for higher education institutions on research, academic skill training and on designing research programmes. Contact: samvada.research@gmail.com