I've always loved the night sky. At the beginning of college, I thought about a career in astrophysics. I took Astronomy 101 during my first semester. After an early class, I spoke with the professor and expressed my interest. I don't remember what advice he gave, but I told all of my freshman friends about it. I had a rude awakening after my first examination. It turned out that for classes that require memorization, I was not able to squeak by with no effort. It actually required studying. I never studied in gradeschool, and I wasn't about to start in my freshman year. It wasn't until Calculus II that I woke up early on a Saturday morning and spent the morning memorizing integrations and working on problem sets. I can't believe it took me so long to learn to study.

I dropped the astronomy class to protect my GPA and didn't tell my friends. I pretended to attend for the rest of the semester, too embarrassed to admit my early failing, especially after my enthusiastic career plans.

As to the title, this is another of my Jewish learnings. If we accept the Jewish teachings, then God created the world for humans to choose His path. This is a very involved concept, and something I really want to write more about (or at least plagerize out of my one of my better Judaism books). To be truly happy, you follow God's laws. It seems almost anticlimatic to know that happiness equates to absolute obedience. The easy question is What happened to free will? (Free will is a core belief in Judaism.) The hard answer is that the choice to follow God's laws is the perfect exercise of your free will. I'm not explaining this well, but there's something more involved in that answer, something that needs a longer sewcrates musing. Don't think that link brings you there. I haven't written it yet. I'm just hopeful, is all.