Goals

It is said that if you want to get anywhere in life it helps to know where you are going. I tend to agree with that, but I think people overstate it a bit.

It is good to have goals in life. With that said, life is what happens when you are making other plans. I like to have a direction in life but be open to possibilities along the way. I'll give an example.

Imagine you have a teenager named Bob. He has made it his goal to attend Harvard University, so he studies hard and does well in school and on the SAT. He applies to Harvard and gets rejected. Nevermind that he was accepted into Columbia, Princeton, Yale, Brown, etc. Harvard was the goal. He didn't achieve the goal, so he is now a FAILURE.

Success and failure are relative. I never could have gone to any of those schools even if I had been accepted into them. I don't really care because I will match my intelligence against any of those Ivy League grads any day of the week. They don't know shit. How do I know this? Who do you think is running our clusterfuck government?! But I digress. . .

I like to have broad goals. So, here's my list of things I want to achieve in my life:

1. HAPPINESS

I want to be happy, and I am happy. I embarked on a study on this subject a few years ago, and I found the answer. I am happy. I realize that we all want to be happy, and it is the ultimate goal in life. But it is readily achieved. Happiness is nothing more than losing yourself in rational activity. As long as I have something to do, I will always have happiness. The easiest way to become happy is to fill your calendar and work. Since discovering the secret of Flow, I have been very happy indeed.

It helps to understand what happiness is not. It is not being drunk or getting laid or what have you. These are pleasures which are always available even in prison. Happiness is different, and it doesn't come from money or women either. It comes from you and doing the things you love.

Lose yourself in a rational pursuit. It might be writing a novel, building a house, playing basketball, learning guitar, or what have you. But if you pursue these things, you will be very happy.

2. LOVE

I always have a girlfriend. I never stay available for long. What frustrates me is being in relationships that don't last that long. I admit that I am the one who ends them, but I don't believe it is my fault. I just get matched with the wrong women who like me a great deal and end up loving me. But they do things I can't go along with.

I am very pleased with my current love interest. I fit with her. Her personality and mine are very compatible. Consequently, I not only love her, but I like her. I realize this everytime I look at my watch and see that the time has flown away. I can't get any sleep because I love staying up just to talk to her. This is 180 degrees of difference from my previous relationship where I was afraid to speak because I would piss her off.

I don't know the secret to long lasting relationships except to say that you should fall in love with someone you can be friends with. If you can't talk to each other, it won't work. That is really the true dealbreaker. When she rolls her eyes at you and looks at you like you are the most despicable person she has ever met, get the fuck out of there. You don't need that woman. She is misery on two legs.

3. FITNESS

This is the easiest thing to achieve but the hardest one to execute on. I want to be fit, and I know the answer to this. It involves getting my ass out the door and pounding the pavement. It isn't rocket science. This is a goal I am working on.

4. WEALTH

This is harder to achieve. I am not rich. But I will be. Whether I will be rich before I am 80 is another matter and which I am working on. I spend my time reading business books, personal finance books, etc. But for me to become fabulously wealthy in a short time, I have to capture what Taleb calls a Black Swan. This is the rare event that no one expects. They happen on a regular basis, but they cannot be seen beforehand. This is the secret behind the book publishing industry and other industries where an unforeseen but serendipitous discovery takes place. I am laying traps for these Black Swans. I will catch one.

These are my goals. They are broad which gives me room to change course. I am flexible and open to new possibilities. I don't care about climbing Everest or any of that shit. I doubt my lifestyle will change all that much except for the impact of technology and government. But I have achieved two goals, and I am working on the other two. These are my goals in life, and they are unchanging even if my path may take turns I never expected. I like my life, and I believe the best is yet to come.

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