I find Abraham Lincoln’s method of planning the most appealing and the most practical. Jokingly, he has stated that his “plan is to have no plan.” When pressed further, he equated his method of planning with how he navigated a river as a riverboat captain. When navigating the river, he would plan his immediate route only as far as he could see, which was the next bend in the river. Once he reached the point he plotted, and turned the bend, he could see a new point to navigate to. In other words, even though he had his ultimate destination in mind, he would only make practical plans based on his ability to see a reasonable path to the next step.

Lincoln didn’t know that General Lee would surrender his army to General Grant at Appomattox in 1865 when he decided to order a resupply of Fort Sumter before the first shots of the Civil War had been fired. From his perspective in 1861, resupplying Fort Sumter was consistent with his ultimate goal to maintain the integrity of the Union. Once the resupply was unsuccessful and shots had been fired, he had a new vantage point and a new course to plot. The goal remained the same — preserve the Union — but the plan remained fluid throughout the war until the end.

I would suggest a Lincolnesque approach to your education plan. If mastery is your goal — and mastery takes 10,000 hours — it is unreasonable to expect to have everything figured out from day one. Van Gogh didn’t know he would paint Starry Night in an expressionist style when he decided to dedicate himself to art. Likewise, you don’t need to know how to accomplish your education goals when you begin. Have faith that along the way you will learn how to finish your goals. The key in the beginning is to create momentum in the right direction.

My grandfather tried to impress this principle upon me when I was young. For career day at my school we were allowed to go with a relative to work. As my dad was in the Marines, we were usually stationed far from family, but for a short time, my dad was assigned in Washington D.C. During this time we lived close to my grandfather, a meteorologist, so I went to work with him.

The day I joined him, my grandfather was constructing computer models to explain why there are droughts in South Africa. For anyone who is curious, it’s because the wind direction at certain times of year pushes clouds against a mountain range before it crosses over the land. The clouds have to dump their moisture before they clear the mountain range, hence the drought. I’m not exactly sure what went into the computer models, except that I think it involved a level of math that was (and is) well beyond what I understand.

On the way home, my grandfather talked to me a little about attending college. My grades had already started to slip as I came to the realization that I wouldn’t be able to afford college. He explained to me that when he started college he didn’t know how he would be able to finish it. He knew, however, that his first step was to start college, so that’s what he did. He figured the rest out on the way. Like Lincoln captaining his riverboat, as his vantage point changed, the next steps became clear to him. He was able to navigate and a plan as far ahead as his vision would allow. Even though my grandfather couldn’t see the path to his ultimate goal clearly early on, that didn’t prevent him from traversing the part of the path he could see.

The ultimate goal, though, is important. It’s the psychological equivalent of the North Star. Not every education plan has to have a college credential attached to it in order to be meaningful, although it may. I believe, however, that it must be a substantial goal in order to provide long-term direction. To return to the Van Gogh example, when he decided to become an artist, he didn’t know exactly what he would do or paint, but realized he needed to master perspective and anatomy. In the beginning he concentrated on that. About three years into his study, given his swelling skill with painting coupled with the realities of his deteriorating health, his vision for himself became clear. His North Star became brighter. In 1883 In a letter to his brother Theo, he wrote:

Not only did I start drawing at a late stage, but added to that it may be that I may not be able to count on so very many years of life.

If I think of it with level-headed reasoning for the purpose of estimation or planning, it is, of course, in the nature of things that I can’t possibly have any certainty of this.

But by comparison with various people whose lives we have known, or with with whom we have something in common, we can surely make certain suppositions that are not totally without foundation. About the time span I have ahead of me in which I can still work, I believe I can accept the fact, without being too premature, that my physical body will last out, all being well, for a certain number of years — a certain number being, say, between six and ten. I dare to accept this, moreover, because at the moment there is not yet an immediate “all being well.”

That is the period I firmly count on; beyond that I would consider it all too much airy speculation to determine for myself, as it will, for instance, particularly depend on these first ten years whether there will be anything after that time or not.

If you wear yourself out too much in those years, then you don’t get beyond forty. If you conserve yourself sufficiently to withstand certain shocks that tend to befall people and overcome more or less complicated physical difficulties, then you move from forty to fifty into new, fairly normal waters.

But calculations about this are at present not on the agenda, although plans for a period of five to ten years are, as I said before. My plan is not to save myself, not to spare emotions or difficulties too much — it is relatively indifferent to me whether I live longer or shorter. I am, moreover, not competent to guide myself physically in the way that, for instance, a doctor can do to some extent.

So I carry on in my ignorance, but knowing this one thing: I must accomplish certain work within a space of a few years; I need not rush, because there is no future in that — but serenely and with composure I must carry on working with as much regulation and concentration as possible, and as much to the point as possible. The world concerns me only in so far as I have a certain debt and duty to it, because I have lived in it for thirty years and owe to it to leave behind some souvenir in the shape of drawings and paintings — not done to please any particular movement, but within which a genuine human sentiment is expressed. This work is therefore my objective — and by concentrating on this thought, it simplifies what I do or don’t do in so far that it does not lead to chaos, but that all I do has one and the same aspiration.

This is not just a goal, but is what Jim Collins, and Jerry I. Porras would call a Big Hairy Audacious Goal (BHAG). The term BHAG comes from their book Built to Last. In researching their book, they studied enduring great institutions to see what made them so successful. One of their key findings was the use of BHAGs to stimulate progress, like Boeing’s commitment to build the 707—the first commercial jet, or Ford’s quest to democratize the automobile. In a previous post, I talked about how Michael Dell liked to use BHAGs. The concept appears to work on an individual level as well as an organizational one. Take a look at the goals of some famous Americans, and decide for yourself how big, hairy and audacious they are:

Walt Disney’s Goals
When he was young, Walt Disney’s first goal was simply to make money drawing. This may seem small compared to what he eventually accomplished, but it was big for him at the time. Later he had the goal of going into business for himself and being his own boss. He failed in his first attempt and succeeded in his second. He then set a goal to produce the best animated shorts. In accomplishing that goal, his company was the first to synchronize sound to animation, the first to have color animation and developed characterization previously unseen in cartoons. Once he felt that he had done all he could with the short, Disney set the goal of a full-length animated feature. This pattern of goal setting continued throughout his life, where even on his deathbed he was planning Epcot Center.

Benjamin Franklin’s Goals
The first meaningful goal we can discern from Franklin’s life is his goal of becoming a good writer. As he got older, he wanted to go into business for himself. Like Disney, this took a couple of attempts. Once he retired from business, he aspired to understand electricity. As a statesman his goal was to avert a war with England and worked for fifteen years to that end. He failed on that one and set a new goal to separate from England. Franklin, along with the other Revolutionaries, sought to create the first modern democracy of its scale. One major goal at his death was to write an autobiography that would provide instruction for Americans on how to be Americans. Even though he didn’t finish the work, he accomplished the goal. The second goal that he was working on was the abolition of slavery, which would be left for others to achieve.

The Wright Brothers’ Goals
The Wrights were always enterprising. At an early age they set the goal of publishing their own newspaper. It was a small enterprise, but quite an accomplishment for a pair of young boys. Later they decided to open a bicycle shop. When they learned of Otto Lilienthal’s death, they entered the field as scientific hobbyists. It’s important to note that they did not initially have the stated goal of solving the flight problem, but rather to contribute to further the knowledge of flight to aid the person who would achieve final success. Along the way they became more ambitious.

Frederick Douglass’s Goals
As a boy, Douglass yearned to learn to read. This simple thing, because of nature of slavery, was an enormous but necessary challenge for him. Douglass set the goal of teaching other slaves to read with limited success. As an adult he set his sights on his freedom. He failed in his first attempt but succeeded in his second. Once free, he simply wanted to get a job, work, and support his family — a simple goal by modern day standards — but for one who was not used to the burdens of a free man it was quite an adjustment. By accident more than by design, Douglass became a great orator who spoke out frequently about the blight of slavery. He set out and wrote a book about his experiences as a slave — then a second — and a third. Along the way, he struck out on his own against the advice of many of his friends and started his own anti-slavery newspaper to work for the freedom of slaves. Once that was achieved he worked for the right of black men to vote. Once that was achieved he turned his attention to women’s suffrage. In fact, on the day he died from a heart attack, he was scheduled to speak, along with Susan B. Anthony, in an attempt to secure equal rights for women.

Notice how their initial goals — to become a better writer, to make money drawing, to publish a small newspaper, to learn to read — all seem to pale in comparison to their later goals. To be sure, though, these initial goals were large for them at the time they made them. It required their full attention and effort. Unlike their later goals, these initial goals seem attainable by mortals and not just the demigods that stare back at us from the pages of history. We can achieve goals like these. I suspect that if we set our minds to it, and we turn that critical first bend on the river, the view would look quite different.

Postscript:
In between the time I started writing this column two weeks ago and now, my grandfather, George Cressman, passed away after a long bout with Alzheimer’s. If not for the disease, I have no doubt that he would have lived well past one hundred. My blog, “The Art of the Three Disciplines,” is inspired by the Marine Corps Martial Arts Program’s dedication to the mental, physical, and character disciplines. Although he was not a Marine, I don’t know of anyone who embodied these principles more than my grandfather. My championship of the Marine Corps’s shift to this three-pronged philosophy has much to do with my grandfather; I recognized that he exemplified this approach, and I have long believed that his example is worth emulation. My grandfather’s mental discipline and integrity were beyond reproach. He was also an avid runner who I could never seem to keep up with. The last time we ran together along the Potomac, he was 80 years old. Because of his Alzheimer’s, (and my unwillingness to cry “uncle” to an 80 year old man) he forgot to turn us around in a timely manner, and we ran for over an hour. He was always like that — setting the bar just to let us know what was possible.

As a child, I was amazed by his accomplishments. He not only attended a university and earned a Doctorate from the University of Chicago, he went on to become the head of the National Weather Service. When I asked my step-grandmother, Fran, if my grandpa found his own accomplishments amazing, she responded, “No, he did not, because he knew how hard he worked to achieve them.”

Although he passed last weekend, because of the way Alzheimer’s affected his mind, I feel that he has been gone for much longer. I wasn’t prepared to hear his advice when I was young, and when I became prepared, he was no longer able to provide mentorship. I believe I understand now what he tried to convey to me as a child. As a testament to the character of this good man, I am happy to share it with you. I hope it sinks in faster with you than it did with me.

Gannon Beck