Each moment in life presents you with an opportunity to consider and move closer toward what you want. For something ever-present from the moment you reach sufficient maturity to make decisions, you might be surprised just how complicated it is. The choice present in each moment includes how much you choose to think about what you want, the time frame you are willing to consider, the options you are aware of, and what each choice is worth. Indeed, the choice is more complicated still, because every choice is connected in time to every other choice. Every choice of how you think, feel, and act now will change what options are available to you in the future.
Long-term happiness requires that you reach and maintain a state where you know what options exist, you have an accurate idea of their cost and benefit, and you choose the one that will provide you with the greatest long-term value. Across time, the joy you obtain will increase with:
- The accuracy of the set of options you consider,
- The consistency with which you choose what is best, and
- The length of the time scales you optimize over.
The problem is that none of these qualities will increase automatically. First, you do not know what options exist because the available options aren’t always clear, and change in complex ways over time and across circumstances. Second, you do not have an accurate idea of their cost and benefit because they, too, change according to circumstances, and can easily be incorrectly estimated. Third, you would not presently choose what has the greatest long-term value, because it requires an immense amount of intentional learning, experimentation, and humility to learn what is valuable.