I often hear, and agree, that life is about the journey not the destination. Life being about the journey means that the meaning of life comes not from the accomplishment of goals but from the embarkment on endeavors and doing of tasks. Meaningful and lasting happiness and fulfillment come from trying and risk-taking, not really from the reward.
It turns out that humans are poor judges for predicating what will make them happy. The human activity of predicting future happiness is called affective or hedonic forecasting. The problem is we are more often than not wrong about what will bring us true happiness or how long it will last. This is called impact bias. To illustrate this point, look at Olympic Gold medalists. If the meaningfulness of life were about the destination, then once someone got a gold medal, we would think they would cease competing. However, we know this is not the case. Athletes, just like all people, go back to the well and relive and replicate the moments that brought them the gold to go for the gold again.
While the payoff for the hard work is the gold, what we hopefully come to appreciate through life is that it is not what we will earn, but how we went about earning it that fills us with joy and pride.
As you look back at your life and what you have done and ahead to what you wish to accomplish ask yourself: How did I do that? How do I want to accomplish my goals? In reflecting on the journey, we might find that while we did not appreciate it at the time, it was the process of getting here was where the joy lay.
This very lesson is illustrated in the Torah. The narrative of the Torah tells us it is not about getting to the promised land but the journey to the promised land that was the point of being liberated from slavery. Life for the Israelites was about what they learned, how they responded to adversity, and celebrated victory in the desert. The point was never to make it into the promised land but to make the journey of growth through the wilderness. It was to recognize what they had accomplished (learning to be a free people and all that entails), not what they did not accomplish (getting into the Promised Land).
Similarly, it is helpful for us to focus on what we did do in life, not what we didn’t do. If we want to be happy and fulfilled, we ought to look at the journey and all we were able to do, and not focus on what we did not get to do or accomplish. There is a poem that is read at funerals that illustrates this point that I would like you to reflect on and see how it might make the prism with which you look at your life differ:
Life is a Journey
Birth is a beginning
And death a destination
And life is a journey:
From childhood to maturity
And youth to age;
From innocence to awareness
And ignorance to knowing;
From foolishness to discretion
And then perhaps to wisdom.
From weakness to strength or
From strength to weakness
And often back again;
From health to sickness,
And we pray to health again.
From offence to forgiveness,
From loneliness to love,
From joy to gratitude,
From pain to compassion,
From grief to understanding,
From fear to faith.
From defeat to defeat to defeat
Until, not looking backwards or ahead,
We see that victory lies not
At some high point along the way
But in having made the journey
Step by step,
A sacred pilgrimage.
Birth is a beginning
And death a destination
And life is a journey.
--Rabbi Alvin Fine from Jewish Reform high holiday prayer book, Gates of Repentance
I hope your journey is a good one and look forward to hearing all about it in the future.
Shabbat Shalom!
