Ideas I'll remember from Agnes Callard - Aspiration

Suppose that you sign up for a classical-music-appreciation class, in which your first assignment is to listen to a symphony. You put on headphones, press Play-and fall asleep. The problem is that you don't actually want to listen to classical music; you just want to want to. Aspiring, Callard thinks, is a common human activity: there are aspiring ... See more

If you make lists of lofty goals, it can be easy to leave them to accumulate, as happens sometimes, into a mountain of to-do ’s and notes and half-forgotten plans. Dreaming alone is seductive, even a little sweet, since it lacks the pain of trying. So it feels proper to prize attempts more than dreams. You should have ideals, but you cannot only lo... See more

"If you make lists of lofty goals, it can be easy to leave them to accumulate, as happens sometimes, into a mountain of to-do's and notes and half-forgotten plans. Dreaming alone is seductive, even a little sweet, since it lacks the pain of trying. So it feels proper to prize attempts more than dreams. You should have ideals, but you cannot only lo... See more