What if someone invented a Hindsight Pill? Wouldn’t it be great if we could view the world through a retrospective lens? How many things we would do differently. How many things we would get right.

We would effectively be living our life in second draft, where all the mistakes get cleaned up, where there is a roadmap that is actually going to take us somewhere, and where the overriding theme is smart design. How many of us get to middle age full of regrets? Probably quite a few. Even those who are happy with their lives would choose to do some things differently.

But I guess the defining feature of the second draft, the clean, more perfect one, is that there had to be a first draft. Without all the stupid mistakes, all the senseless muck-ups, wrong choices, bad scenes, disloyal friends, horror jobs and avoidable accidents, there could be no clean version. This is why we are stuck with past, present, and future imperfect.

Would we really be happier with this cleaner, streamlined life devoid of mistakes and wrong turns? Probably. But perhaps the reason happiness is sharper in the imperfect life, is in the knowledge of how hard it is to get there. The view from the top is surely sweeter because the climb wasn’t easy. Still, I’m not so sure about that. When I visit my beloved mountain, am I less thrilled at the view from the top because I rode a ski lift to get there in ten minutes? Would it really look any better if I had to hoist my skis on my back and drag myself up the slope, dead-weight-boots and all? I don’t think so. I think I’d probably get to the top and think it wasn’t worth it. I think the next time, I’d choose to stay put and have a sandwich instead. Who needs a view?

So it’s interesting to consider why we struggle so when faced with improbability, impossibility, and extreme discomfort. Some things are so desirable that we will put ourselves through anything in order to have a shot. Also, if we don’t put ourselves through hell to get closer to our passions, what else are we going to do with our time? With our lives? I guess you could argue that we’d just live a comfortable, mediocre life (nothing wrong with that). But it would be a flat, sepia world, instead of 3D technicolour.

Oh, well… 3D often gives me a headache.