October 23, 2026
Last night I had a telling dream. I had just finished a new proposal for my second doctoral dissertation. It was pages and pages and pages long. Rereading it before turning it in, I realized that I was setting myself up to do the impossible. There was no way I could ever complete it. I don’t even remember the subject, just that I would never get it done.
My mother must have sent me that dream. As she watched my adult life unfold, she told me that I needn’t set another goal for myself just to prove that I was smart enough or good enough for this life. I didn’t think that was what I was doing, but she may have been right.
From early on, a pernicious correlation was made for me in my Roman Catholic grade school education between academic achievement and “goodness.” Not only did I receive attention for good grades, but I remember the priest telling me every time he gave out report cards that my father would be very proud of me. Whether that meant my human father or the “Father” who lived in heaven, I do not know. They were often conflated. I believe I took it as both, and therefore saw academic accomplishment as some kind of moral requirement. One, at least, that I knew how to engage in.
Now in retirement, however, I definitely think that goodness is less linked to pursuing excellence than it is to letting go of trying to do the impossible – such as achieving “goodness” through accomplishment. Such as “achieving” goodness at all!
