The Future Is Not Obligated to Your Plan

Plans can be helpful. But having one doesn’t guarantee the future will conform to your wishes.

Oliver Burkeman puts it this way:

We treat our plans as though they are a lasso, thrown from the present around the future, in order to bring it under our command. But all a plan is – all it could ever possibly be – is a present-moment statement of intent. It’s an expression of your current thoughts about how you’d like to deploy your modest influence over the future. The future, of course, is under no obligation to comply.

Thinking ahead is valuable, and plans have their place. Just don’t get frustrated when they inevitably change and the future turns out different than you expected.

You can try to control the future, but remember: “the future…is under no obligation to comply.”