I used to spend my days trying to meticulously optimize my future: make it the way I wanted it. And then it all came crashing down—I’d built a house of cards. Which is not to say I’d built nothing. I’d gathered wisdom through that experience. It taught me that to create an enjoyable future, you must enjoy the present. The present is the foundation to the future, and you can’t build lasting happiness on a bedrock of needing things to be different to the way they are. That is a shaky foundation.