"Shoot for the moon. Because even if you miss, you'll land among the stars." Most of us have probably heard some version of this, right?
It occurred to me in a morbidly hilarious epiphany this morning that the above statement is blatantly false. I mean, realistically, if you're shooting for the moon and miss, you'll probably either A) run out of food and starve to death somewhere in space or B) fall back toward Earth and be incinerated as you re-enter the atmosphere.
This is not to say that I don't think it's important to dream big. But star/night sky/space metaphors seem too dreamy and romantic for me; perhaps, in the words of Rilke, "the purpose of life is to be defeated by greater and greater things."
But of course, that's hardly motivational enough for colorful posters on elementary school classroom walls.
