Farfetching

a goal cuts off avenues for exploration. It welds you to what past-you wanted, effectively disenfranchising present- and future-you. That is, in fact, the point: by committing to a goal, you commit to not wandering off your chosen path. But that means that when things show up along that path—new opportunities or new knowledge, or simply changing conditions—you lack the license to veer off or head in another direction.

That’s me. I don’t go where I planned, because I didn’t plan anywhere, but I do get somewhere.

I like to talk about intentions rather than goals. An intention, as I’m using it here, is a kind of bending of the self towards something, a commitment not to a specific path but to a scope of attention or way of being...Instead of something you might achieve, it becomes something you do; instead of someone you could be, it becomes someone you are.

As a non-goal oriented person, I approve of this message.