“Plan” is a
flexible verb, an elastic concept. People talk about meticulous choreography,
a step-by-step progression. That’s how many people approach the future, and for
some of them, it’s the right call.
But what
those people see as a risk-minimizing strategy always seemed dangerous to me,
because it presumes a degree of control over events that most of us don’t
really have and a predictability by which the world doesn’t operate. It also
creates a merciless yardstick: If things don’t happen a certain way by a
certain point, you’re off course. You’re behind schedule. You’ve failed.
But
there’s another kind of planning. It involves knowing generally what
you’re after, preparing for a range of possibilities therein,
not so much writing a script as sculpting a space:
You want a
career in the law, but you choose your focus — or it chooses you — as you go
along.
You want to
arm yourself with the skills and sensibility to start a business, but the
nature of that enterprise will be determined by circumstances that you can’t,
and shouldn’t, guess right now.
You want to
lavish your energy on — and earn your keep with — words, but whether they’re in
screenplays, novels, magazines or newspapers is up for grabs.
We
talk too little about that kind of map, though it has much to recommend it,
including its allowance for serendipity, for surprise, which can thrill as
often as it disappoints.