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You set a goal (make video games) then gave up on it (didn't make video games), thus failing that goal. It isn't madness, nor is it rocket surgery. It's pure se

• JohnBooty 7y ago
  If you walked into your kitchen with the goal of making a sandwich and decided you wanted some oatmeal instead, would you call that a "failure?" Did you experience a "defeat?" Most wouldn't say that you "failed" at making a sandwich unless you truly attempted to assemble a sandwich and were unable to do so. Most would not consider me to have "failed" to become a game developer unless I'd made a true attempt at doing so: applying for jobs and failing to obtain one, or perhaps obtaining jobs and failing at those. Just as very few would consider me to have failed at becoming an astronaut or a professional hockey player, two other things I wanted to be as a child. Strict definitions of "failure" aside, though, what I found really bizarre and bleak was the parent poster's claim that enjoying one's newly chosen goal+outcome to require an act of willful cognitive dissonance.