Don’t chase happiness, chase grasshoppers

Turns out…

We’re not that great at predicting how future events will make us feel, nor for how long those events might leave us feeling any particular way…

Mostly because we have no idea how much we will have changed as a person by the time the future arrives…

It also turns out, we’re pretty bad at predicting how much time changes who we are, what we care about, and what we’re capable of…

As a result, it’s pretty tough to aim directly at happiness…

Or even the things that we think will make our future selves happy…

But with the ongoing moment to moment process of feedback & calibration…
(trying a thing, evaluating the results, modifying future actions)

We can certainly improve our aim along the way…

But some methods of improvement are better than others…

In The Journey of Crazy Horse, Joseph M. Marshall III reveals the training methods used for the adolescent boys of the Oglala Lakota to sharpen their aim with a bow and arrow…

After learning to consistently fly their arrow through the center of a rolling hoop, they’re taught to lay still in a field, holding their arrow ready, and wait for a grasshopper to appear as it leaps through the air…

Difficult, yes…
Impossible, no…

But if you really want to sharpen your aim…

Chase grasshoppers.

Until next time,
Kevin