The Long Game

We make thousands of significant decisions over a lifetime. It is tempting to think that if we simply make each isolated choice intelligently based upon what we know at that moment, the series of choices will work out fine over our lifetime. Unfortunately, that is not true. Viewing each decision in isolation will prevent us from maximizing the value of the entire series.

The primary reason behind that fact is this: our future flexibility becomes constrained by our past decisions. It is a powerful advantage to recognize how our choices today can increase or decrease the number and variety and value of choices that will be available to us tomorrow.

We cannot go through life simply making the best choice in the moment of each isolated decision and expect to achieve the best outcome across the entire series of decisions in life. We have to play the long game…as a long game.