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👋 Welcome to the 140th issue of Open Loops, a weekly newsletter on clarity, growth, and building a life that feels like yours.
My name is Reza and each week, I sift through 100+ books, articles, podcasts, and (way too many) tweets to bring you the best in this newsletter.
Most people confuse goals with aims.
Your goal is the target. Your aim is the trajectory.
Everyone sets goals. They pick a destination and stare at it.
But staring at where you want to be doesn't move you closer.
Your aim is different.
It's the course you set. The habits you build. The decisions you repeat.
Goals obsess over the finish line. Aims obsess over the path.
When you focus on your aim, the process becomes the goal. You stop waiting to arrive and start moving.
The target matters less than the trajectory.
The path is the point.
No one should ever work.
Work is the source of nearly all the misery in the world. Almost any evil you’d care to name comes from working or from living in a world designed for work. In order to stop suffering, we have to stop working.
That doesn’t mean we have to stop doing things. It does mean creating a new way of life based on play; in other words, a ludic revolution.
📝 Get my Annual Review template
The year you don't examine is the year you're destined to repeat.
In case you missed this last week, or just recently joined the community…
Every year, I sit down with 35 questions across different life areas to capture the moments and experiences that shaped the last 12 months.
If that resonates with you, I've put together a simple template to guide you through your own reflections and help you set meaningful intentions for 2026.
Fifteen years ago, the internet was an escape from the real world. Now, the real world is an escape from the internet.
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The unintelligent jump to conclusions. The wise just observe. Wisdom comes from removing the junk, lies, and obstacles to clear thinking.
Things take longer to happen than you think they will, and then they happen faster than you thought they could.
At the end of your life, I think you’ll look back at all the times where you gave yourself so wholly to something, as some of the most enriching experiences.
Living a constantly balanced life aims to keep all areas of our life at a steady happy medium - but there’s so much beauty and life in letting ourselves get lost in one area or the other from time to time.
Till next time 👋
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My curated list of the 33 books that shaped how I think about identity, direction, and building a life that feels like your own.