Driving Blind: Why Your Career Feels Like a Snow Squall

When you can't see where you're going, someone else's taillights become your plan.

Last week I hit a wall of snow on the highway. It was one of those classic Ontario squalls where visibility drops to fifty feet and every driver becomes a white-knuckled philosopher questioning their life choices.

In that moment, I wasn’t “making decisions.”

I was reacting.

Slow down. Follow the taillights. Hope nothing suddenly materializes out of the white.

When you can’t see ahead, you can’t think strategically.

You think in ten-second increments.

You think, don’t crash right now.

Sadly, this is how most people navigate their careers.

SMART Goals That Are Dumb

We’ve been trained to set SMART goals.

Specific. Measurable. Achievable. Relevant. Time-bound.

So we dutifully create and chase them.

Hit Q3 targets.

Get the promotion.

Increase compensation by 15%.

Complete the certification.

All perfectly SMART, and potentially incredibly stupid.

Because without a clear vision of where you’re actually trying to go, you’re just optimizing tactics in a snow squall. You’re focused on speeding up, but who the hell knows what you’re going to hit, or if you’re even going in the right direction?

The Generic Platitude Problem

Ask someone what they want long-term and you’ll get:

“I want to be happy”
“I want financial security”
“I want work that doesn’t drain me”

Those are bumper stickers, not a vision for a life.

What does happy look like on a random Tuesday afternoon?

What specific freedoms does “financial security” buy you?

What would you do on a Saturday even if no one paid you?

Most people have no idea. And that vagueness isn’t an accident.

Why You Keep It Vague on Purpose

Here’s what you refuse to admit to yourself: keeping your vision foggy is intentional.

It’s a protection racket you’re running on yourself.

But why the hell would you do that? Why set yourself up to fail? Your psychology, trying to protect you from yourself.

Because clarity has consequences.

The Embarrassment Gap. Your real vision might have nothing to do with your current identity. You’re a senior manager dreaming of opening a bookshop? A software architect imagining yourself as a therapist? Try explaining that to your spouse. The wider the gap between where you are and where you want to be, the more ridiculous it feels to say out loud. “I want something more meaningful” is safe. Your actual vision invites judgment. Eyebrows might be raised.

The Clean Fantasy Problem. In your head, your vision stays pristine. Perfect. Untouched by harsh reality, and still possible. Maybe even probable. But the moment you speak it, write it down, start working toward it—you realize how damn hard it actually is. The obstacles appear. The self-doubt screams. The gap between here and there looks impossibly wide. So you keep it theoretical, where it can never disappoint you.

The Accountability Trap. If no one knows your vision, you never have to pursue it. You never have to fail publicly. (And you’re going to fail at first, for a while.) You get to preserve the illusion of “I could do it if I really wanted to, when I have the time” even as the years drift by and you haven’t taken a single damn step.

Your vagueness isn’t confusion. It’s a strategy you’re unconsciously using to protect yourself.

It’s Costing You Everything

Here’s what happens when you operate without a clear vision: you don’t just stay stuck. You actively move in the wrong direction.

That promotion you took? The one with the bigger title and the 20% raise? You said yes because it seemed like progress, and that’s just “what successful people do”. More money, more responsibility, more prestige. All the markers of success.

But now you’re managing people instead of doing the work you loved. You’re in meetings all day instead of solving problems. You’re three years deeper into a career path that’s taking you further from the life you actually want.

You didn’t intentionally choose that path, but sort of drifted into it. Because in a snow squall, any set of taillights feels like the right ones to follow.

Without a vision, every “opportunity” looks the same. You can’t evaluate whether something moves you closer to or further from your destination—because you don’t have a destination. So you optimize for the default metrics: money, title, status. And you wake up five years later wondering how you got so far off track.

That’s not bad luck. That’s the inevitable result of making decisions in a snow squall.

The Alternative

When the snow clears and you can see the horizon, everything changes. You know which exits to take and which to pass. You know when to speed up and when to pull over. The decisions become obvious because you can see where you’re going.

Vision isn’t about having a perfect plan. It’s about having a destination vivid enough that you can tell whether each choice pulls you closer or pushes you further away.

Without it, you’re just following someone’s taillights and calling it progress.

And that’s a tragic way to spend a life.

Quotation I’ve Been Pondering

“If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favorable.”

— Seneca

Journal Prompt

“What exit have you been passing, over and over, because choosing it would require admitting what you really want?”

Until next week!!

Work and live well.

Tim

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