When Max was younger, he once asked his parents why there was a maze. His parents didn’t understand the question. When he persisted, they told him that some questions have no answers and that the maze simply is. When he asked why the maze was designed the way it was, and why it had so many useless paths, they told him not to waste time wondering why.
They told him to focus, instead, on learning how to navigate the maze. You don’t get to the cheese by wondering why, they said; you get to it by running around the maze as fast as you can. The maze, they explained, was a given. You work with what you’re given. It is pretty arrogant for a young mouse to think that he could do otherwise, they cautioned.
Max was not blessed with the virtue of blind obedience. Instead, he continued to annoy his parents, his friends, his teachers, and anyone else who made the mistake of discussing such matters with him. The more he questioned, the more he discovered how little the other mice understood. They knew a whole lot, but they understood very little.
...
Max was determined to discover who had moved the cheese. He was determined to discover why they had moved it. He was determined to discover why the maze was the way it was. And he was determined to change what he did not like about the maze. And so he set about it.
And a long time passed.