Ready...aim... adapt!

March 11, 2021

You know that far-away target you're aiming at? You won't hit it. Not exactly, anyway. And it doesn't matter.

One of my daughter Ella's classes is a required "careers" seminar. Classes are virtual, and a fair amount of the content is being supplied by online TED Talks. Now, I like a good TED talk as much as the next girl, but the ones Ella has been assigned pretty much boil down to "Have a dream! Don't give up on your goals!" These talks annoy her; she feels they lack substance and waste her time. They annoy me, too, mostly because much of the guidance amounts to what I see as a trap.

How can a kid know what she wants to do in life? She can't, not precisely, and (contrary to college applications essay strategies) that's just fine. Sure, succeeding at anything worthwhile, like business or parenting or writing a book or ramping up your exercise regimen, requires creating a vision of where you want to go, formulating as smart a plan as you can for getting there, and then blasting off in that general direction. The readings and videos for Ella's class say as much, and that part isn't objectionable. But there's a secret they should be adding to the strategy but never do: This strategy works best for short-term goals rather than long-term goals, because no matter what your long-term destination may be at this moment, you almost certainly won't get there. At least, not exactly there. Maybe you'll get close, maybe you won't. The key to success—to overall success, that is—is not to get trapped by the way you thought yesterday if you trip over new information today.

This is a tough concept for kids, the idea that long-term goals have to be both vivid (so you can stay motivated to get there) and flexible (because life happens, and everything changes). You set your sights on a target. You take a step in that direction. Things change, a little or a lot. You learn something new. You get a different idea. You shift your direction a few degrees. You take another step. More life happens, maybe even a pandemic. And so on. Success means keeping up the general pace, not stopping at the end of the street.

No one can know what the next several decades hold, especially given how dramatically things have changed in just a year. If we’ve learned anything, it’s that adaptability can be just as, or more, important than goal-setting. After all, I never met the career goals I set as a teenager before the internet existed, and thank goodness for that! I'm trying to help my kids realize it's better to set their eyes on today's prize, not yesterday's—and that it all might change tomorrow—without them despairing of having dreams at all. I'll let you know down the road if it worked.

Ready... aim... adapt!

—Deb