A man walks into a doctor’s office. The man’s been the doctor’s patient for years. His reason for the appointment?

            “I’ve got this small bump on the back of my neck, doc. It’s been there as long as I can remember, though often I forget about it, because it’s not painful, and it doesn’t itch. It can’t be popped. But when I feel it—in the shower or something—and think about it, it bothers me. Can you remove it?”

            “That’s just a natural part of your skin,” says the doctor. “It’s never hurt you and it never will.”

            The man sauntered about, dancing around the point passively, figuring his presence would have been assertive enough. He couldn’t seem to get his doctor to see it his way. It was bothersome.

            “I assure you,” said the doctor, “you’re going to be fine.” The man had no choice but to agree, to comply and to leave.

            Once he was gone the doctor thought to himself: it’s not enough to just be ok anymore. People want to be newborns again. No—people want to be born again. They want to be perfect. They want to be robots. But what do they need?

            He thought for a short while. No more than a minute or two. It was obvious:

            He quit.