Best way to plan is to look backward

Where don't we want to go, and how do you get there? Instead of looking for success, make a list of how to fail instead -- through sloth, envy, resentment, self-pity, entitlement, and the mental habits of self-defeat. Avoid these qualities and you will have success.

Tell me where I'm going to die, that is, so I don't go there.

Charlie Munger quoted in Warren Buffett, The snowball, p. 770.