S1E91: Of the Art of Setting and Achieving Goals

When I consider the peculiar human tendency to set goals, to reach ever forward into the mists of future time and plant our flags of intention there, I cannot help but marvel at both the audacity and the necessity of such an enterprise. For what creature but man makes such deliberate designs upon tomorrow? The swallow builds her nest, true enough, but she does so by instinct rather than careful planning. The squirrel gathers his nuts, but does not sit beneath the oak tree sketching out a five-year strategy for acorn acquisition. We alone among Earth's beings engage in this curious practice of imagining what might be and then laboring to make it so.I have spent many hours in my tower, surrounded by my books and looking out over the Périgord countryside, contemplating this distinctly human compulsion to set goals and shape our futures. Sometimes I wonder if we do not make ourselves slaves to our objectives, forever chasing the next achievement like a dog pursuing its own tail. And yet, I cannot deny that my own life has been enriched and given direction by the goals I have set, even those I failed to achieve. Perhaps especially those I failed to achieve, for they taught me most about myself and the nature of human striving.When I was young, I burned with ambition like any other man of my station. I dreamed of glory in politics, of making my mark upon the world through great deeds and wise governance. How many hours did I spend imagining myself delivering stirring speeches in the parliament, crafting laws that would echo through the ages? Yet life, in its wisdom, had other plans for me. My dear friend Étienne de La Boétie died young, and in my grief I found myself turning away from public ambition toward more private contemplations. My goals shifted from the grandeur of political achievement to the more modest but perhaps more profound aim of understanding myself and human nature through these essays.