> I have the impression, reading these forums, that many people take a
> whole lot of life's pleasure's much more seriously than I do.
But this assumes that planning is serious. Maybe that's the difference--maybe you always find planning to be a serious, non-fun activity? I enjoy planning things that I enjoy. Planning can *be* one of life's pleasures.
If I sit down with a stack of seed catalogs and make a list of seeds to buy, and then come back two days later and modify it, and do that three or four more times, I'm enjoying that process. From what I read in garden books and on garden forums, the same is true of many other gardeners.
I don't go through the annual seed-listing ritual in the fear that without these plans I might do something wrong. I don't do it because I'm worried. I do it because it's fun. Edited to add: And it doesn't impose an obligation, not even to myself. More than once, I've had a lovely time making a list of seeds, and then decided not to order any of them.
Planning is so much fun that for serious activities I have to force myself to do *less* planning than I'm inclined to, because the planning can get in the way of the doing. But for fun activities, I'll do what I please, and that often includes planning or overplanning.
> And we
> have discussed this in other threads, too. I simply would not enter
> things like watching movies, reading novels or playing music, because
> in most cases I do not see those as an obligation; just as a nice
> pastime/pleasure that I do not need to worry about whether I do or
> don't do.
But, again, planning doesn't have to equate to worrying.
I just heard about two new musicians tonight, whose music I'd like to hear. I'm adding their names to my OmniFocus inbox, and will eventually transfer those names to my WatchReadListen list. This means that later when I'm thinking, "Hey, who was that really interesting singer in that documentary?" or "I'm tired of my current playlists; what can I add?" I have that list available to me and I might order a couple of CDs.
No, I'm not *worried* about coming up empty when I ask myself those questions, but I'm going to enjoy the process of remembering and recovering those names, so why not?
> Even truly important absolute needs, such as eating food, I
> do not put on my list or calendar, simply because I am not worried,
> not because I do not care.
But if you made a note, "Try garlic chicken finger recipe in January 2012 Fine Cooking" would that mean that you were worried or afraid that you might forget to try that recipe, or would it just mean that you enjoyed trying something new?
Planning, IMO, doesn't need to be about fear or obligation. It can be about pleasure. Of course it doesn't need to be about pleasure for you, but it seems that you're assuming that when anyone plans, they're doing it out of fear or obligation, and then you logically wonder why they would want to weigh down their pleasures with fear and obligation. And I'm saying that that interpretation is likely to be frequently incorrect--when I plan my pleasures, I'm not weighing them down with fear or obligation, I'm adding to the pleasure.
Edited to add: To put it another way, I think that you're combining two concepts (planning and fear) to form a conclusion, and while those concepts go together for you, they don't go together for many others, and therefore the conclusion doesn't apply to others. My planning doesn't produce complete control. It doesn't reduce spontaneity. It isn't about fear. It isn't about obligation. It's a pleasurable way to think about the things that I enjoy.