Goal of the day: 130 words. Written: 311.
The biggest problem with thinking about the end of life is... We have no idea what it will look like. In fact, it's hard to predict life just three years in advance, let alone for the whole duration.
For the most part, our life is a guessing game. Just like it was for our parents or grandparents - you can go and ask them what they planned when they were younger and what they actually did.
From the moment we start thinking with our heads, we want to become something. Usually something famous, successful, rich, happy or something like that - whether it is defined by a profession or the number of children we want in our family.
However.
1) We don't know if we will become those people.
In fact, even if we plan, or our parents plan for us from childhood, we don't know if it will come true. Perhaps it is better to call it "guessing" rather than "planning".
Accidents, heart attacks, armed Buddhist terrorist attacks, despair and suicidal urges, changes in the economy, political system or hobbies. All of these can happen. Maybe not at the same time (let's face it, it would be an interesting scenario), but any one of these things is enough.
I could give you dozens of examples from the lives of famous or not-so-famous people. But I will take the trouble to do so, because I am sure that you yourself will remember at least one.
If not, then tell me, are you really seeking and desiring at this moment what you most wanted when you were seven? Seventeen? Or twenty-seven?
2) Most of the time, we don't become these people.
Even though we try hard, stretch ourselves like a rubber band, read self-help books and all kinds of Debesylas, or work 15 hours a day and get more and more tired. ...Still we get nothing.
In fact, some people are even starting to think like this:
"I work, I work and I earn nothing. ...That means I need to work harder!"
- Your thoughts, perhaps?
But why? For what?
Why is it assumed that if you keep doing what you've been doing and what hasn't worked, it will magically start working? After one more day at a job you hate, a few more new acquaintances, or when your savings in the bank cross the five-zero zone?
Again, these are not rhetorical questions. Answer them.
Asking,
Daniel