> The obvious conclusion of this is that this implies you should have no goals for the future, you should work towards nothing, and just take life as it comes.

That kind of black-and-white thinking is exactly what the article is nudging you into letting go of. Nowhere does it say not to have goals. Rather, it says not to confuse those goals with reality, not to spend all your time protecting a hypothetical future when you can only ever live in the present. Nowhere does it say work towards nothing. Rather, it says work is something to be experienced for its own sake, rather than just as some suffering to get through in order to achieve an end.

Yes, take life as it comes, including the fact that setting goals and working towards them might be something that makes you happy. However, when goals become obsessions and happy work turns to fear of failure and anxiety, you're defeating the entire purpose of setting goals and working in the first place.

> You can't control the future, but I feel that intelligent planning is important.

Gen. Eisenhower had a quote he liked: "In preparing for battle, I have always found that plans are useless but planning is indispensable."

Edit: Having read the article again I'm not so sure that it is truly so laissez-faire. I can vouch for the idea of self-improvement via letting go, for instance. I have improved myself over time, but it only started happening once I stopped caring so much about improving myself and instead let myself drift into being better bit by bit.

Likewise I've found that I feel better about myself and the world the more I allow myself to simply drift and experience it. Conversely I get more agitated and worried the more I try to swim in the current of existence. That doesn't mean I just tread water, you have to meet Maslow's needs after all. But once those needs are met it's prudent to step back every once in awhile, there won't always be a later to push important things off to.

I think it's more about working backward from goals to things you can do now.

Your goal is to lose x pounds by y date? You can't really control that. What you can control is what you eat today, and how you exercise today. (Which could be based on what you did the day before)

It's a little like the "goals vs systems" thinking from Scott Adams.