How To Work On A Long Term Plan (Without Having One)

There are many people who want to work toward a long-term goal, but they just don't have one. They don't know what they'll be doing in the next five or ten years. They don't know what life has in store for them. Maybe they'll be in a different town with a different job or a completely different person. So how can you work on a long-term plan when you're not sure what that goal should look like? Well, this is how.

Welcome to Alux!

All right, so to play the long game, you need a couple of things to work in your favor. Let's kick things off by talking about luck. Now, there are two types of luck: the traditional kind, where you buy one lottery ticket and it just so happens that you win a million dollars. You don't care about this one because you cannot plan for it. And then there's planned luck. Now, this happens when opportunity meets availability. You're in the right place at the right time.

So we like to split availability into three different categories: the availability of resources, the availability of energy, and the availability of skill. Let's talk about each one of them individually.

Now, availability of resources means you have extra time and money at the end of the day or at the end of the month. Extra money could be used in three ways: to fall back on, to acquire immediate gains, or to invest for future gains, which is the literal definition of investing. You don't need a long-term plan to justify making extra money. Each of these three use cases has their long-term purpose.

Extra money to fall on means you can take extra risk or be safe if something unforeseeable happens. Extra money to acquire immediate gains means you can upgrade the quality of your life. You can probably think of situations where a great opportunity came along, but you just couldn't afford to take part in it. This fixes that. And the extra money for investing for the long run? Well, that's self-explanatory, right?

So the first step in playing the long game without a particular goal in mind is to find ways to increase your earnings in order to fill out those three scenarios. Now, availability of time is a bit more interesting. It means affording to spend ten to twenty hours each week on something outside of your usual life schedule. It's all about how you operate on a daily level.

Because here's the thing, okay? The vast majority of people spend their time the following way: they fill it out with distractions until some outside authority requires their presence. They scroll on TikTok until they need to get to work. They watch TV until they need to go to bed. And they go on vacation until they need to get back to work because those vacation days are all used up. Their schedule is technically full, but it's full of nonsense.

Availability of time means organizing your days or weeks in a way that breaks free from that cycle. It's about having slots of time dedicated specifically to yourself, not just time that you wait to pass by until you have to do something. Why is this important in the long-term plan? Well, because it gives you room to look outside of your window, figuratively speaking. It gives you a chance to peek behind the curtain to see what's ahead or what's coming up.

Imagine you have one hour every day that's specifically designed so nobody bothers you. You go to a coffee shop, you grab a cup of coffee, and just look at people passing by. Your mind settles, you get calm, new ideas come to light, and you break away from that mundane routine. You need to be able to get into this state to see where the future is going.

Another use of the availability of time is having one to two hours a day to educate yourself about things that interest you without feeling the guilt that you were supposed to be doing something else.

This brings us to the next point: availability of energy. You can't play the long-term game if your present is chaotic and drains you of every little ounce of energy. This has to do with how you organize your life in general and how you manage to balance everything. Prolonged periods of high stress just cannot push you forward. There's no glory in making a highly demanding environment.

Availability of energy means minimizing the effort it takes to maintain your current life, and you do this by eliminating as many friction points as possible. For example, let's say you go to the gym because you figured out that a healthy body makes sense for the long term, which it does. Now, having to wake up super early to make it to the gym on time and back home again only creates unnecessary friction.

It makes way more sense to use that extra money that you made to go to a gym that's closest to you, even if it's more expensive, which in turn gives you extra time while also removing the friction of having to wake up extra early. It all works together. You see, this is a fundamental mistake most people make when thinking about playing the long game.

It's not about hoarding resources; actually, as a matter of fact, it is quite the opposite. It's about using all of your resources in a way that gives you time and mental space that prepares you for the future. This brings us to our next point: availability of skill. What do you do with the extra time and mental space that you manage to achieve so far? You either get better at what you do or you add a new skill.

Imagine a spot opens up for the job you always dreamed of, but you only dreamed of it. You never actually prepared for it, and you watch it sadly go by. Or imagine you have a great idea, something that really excites you. You daydream about it; maybe you even wrote some notes, but you never got into it because you're simply not good enough. You find only problems or ways it will not work.

Well, this is where availability of skill comes in. All the prep work you did was to put you in a position where learning, practicing, and educating yourself is optimal. When people say they don't have the time, energy, or money to improve their lives, it's not that they don't have those resources. No, it's just they use them without a proper direction.

You see, you don't need to have a grandiose goal or a particular point you have to achieve in order to feel accomplished. Good things can happen to you without you specifically planning for them. The only thing that matters is your availability when those good things come near you. Other people will call it luck because, from the outside, they can't see how you carefully manage your resources to make everything possible.

You see, to win a race, you need A) to know the race is happening, B) the resources to participate, and C) the skills to actually have a chance at winning. If you get this quote-unquote luck thing sorted out, you're already planning for the future far better than probably anyone you know.

In other, more simpler terms, if you want to play the long game and you don't actually know what the game is, well, all you have to do is be proactive. Proactive with how you spend your resources and your time. Give yourself space so that adding something new to your life doesn't feel overwhelming but exciting. This will vastly increase your chances of being in the right game.

And speaking of chances, there's one more thing to add to this list. Think of it as a bonus. It's a mindset change, okay? A different way to view things. Here it is: focus on probability rather than possibility.

Because the phrase "anything is possible" is technically correct, sure, but it doesn't provide you with any information to work with. Here's an example: is it possible for you to start a tech company today and sell it for $100 million in five years? Sure, it's possible. It doesn't defy any laws of physics or anything. But is it probable? Well, now we're talking numbers.

With no tech experience, no business experience, and no resources, your chances of success are probably below 1%. But the more you add, the more that number increases. If you already reached two to three successful businesses, suddenly your chances shot up by 20 to 30%. You get some tech experience? Another 10%. You have access to resources? Another 10%.

You see, when serious entrepreneurs start businesses, it's not because there is a possibility of winning; it's because they have a high probability of winning given their knowledge, resources, and so on. They look at the numbers, and if the probability of success is high enough to justify the effort, well, they go for it. You need to do the same here.

Instead of focusing on the rhetorical idea of possibility, focus on probability. There are a million angles that you could take to this. Doing interesting things and becoming an interesting person will increase the probability of meeting interesting people. Increasing your skills and educating yourself will increase the probability of increasing your earning potential. Taking care of yourself will increase the probability of experiencing a better life.

You see, you don't need to see the end goal to do the right thing. You don't need a great idea to get to work. You've already got everything you need to make long-term progress. It's just a matter of doing it.

We hope you got a fresh perspective today, Aluxer, and you learned something valuable. We'll see you back here for the Sunday motivational video. Until then, take care, my friend.