The highest purpose is to have no purpose at all. This puts one in accord with nature in her manner of operation.
"We are all descendants of successful maters, not unsuccessful ones, and this has shaped our mating psychology in profound ways."
The world is a very complicated place, and it's not always easy to understand what's happening around us.
I'm a failed poet. Maybe every novelist wants to write poetry first, finds he can't and then tries the short story which is the most demanding form after poetry. And failing at that, only then does he turn to the novel.