Is it possible for someone to have a plan and not have one at the same time?

[Der/die AtheistIn]

Imagine that someone you know very well has an achievable plan to do something. 
The person has at least average intelligence. Not only does this person say out loud that they're sure their goals and way of obtaining said goals are good, but there is evidence to support that they truly believe that. You know them personally and you can tell.
They don't feel any pressure not to follow their plan or if they do it won't stop them. If anything, they feel more pressure to follow their plan.
There is also plenty of time.
Inspite all of this they don't succed and it's their fault. 
Let's say that they did an obvious mistake, that could've been easily avoided. They didn't fuck up because of pressure or curiosity. In fact, they should've been pressured not to do that mistake. It is something that does not go against any of their beliefs. 
It's like their trying to make a puzzle and manage to almost finish in a (relatively) short time and are very determined to finish it, but they forget to put the last piece. They're not tired, said piece is right in front of their eyes as well as it's place. The puzzle isn't complicated, it doesn't have a lot of pieces. They're also not bored of the puzzle and they're not lazy, at least when it comes to this puzzle. Inspite of all of that, they still don't see that it has a missing piece.
What do you think can be the reason behind it?

[tackattack]

No clue, your obfuscation has me totally befuddled. Not even sure what you're asking. Could you fill in the blanks with a fake example if you don't want to give details?

[brewer]

Is this about your parents and how they raised you, again?

[Der/die AtheistIn]

Is this about your parents and how they raised you, again?

Maybe you think that I complain too much about it. I understand if you feel that way. It's just that I want to find an explanation.
I remember that I made a post about the religious incident with them and you answerd that my mom might be like sheep.
To be honest I don't know if that's the case. She wanted me to have a certain interpretation about religion, yet didn't tell me said interpretaion. How is this being sheep?
You don't have to ask any questions whatsoever to come to the conclusion that you should tell kids what you want them to know. Society wasn't pushing her not to.
Most of her closed ones are moderates as well If she wanted me to fit in, she should've told me her interpretation.
It was right in front of her eyes.

[tackattack]

If your question is “why do people not see what’s right in front of them and communicate things?” I would answer usually selective bias

[brewer]

Is this about your parents and how they raised you, again?

Maybe you think that I complain too much about it. I understand if you feel that way. It's just that I want to find an explanation.
I remember that I made a post about the religious incident with them and you answerd that my mom might be like sheep.
To be honest I don't know if that's the case. She wanted me to have a certain interpretation about religion, yet didn't tell me said interpretaion. How is this being sheep?
You don't have to ask any questions whatsoever to come to the conclusion that you should tell kids what you want them to know. Society wasn't pushing her not to.
Most of her closed ones are moderates as well If she wanted me to fit in, she should've told me her interpretation.
It was right in front of her eyes.

There may be no explanation, and if there is it can only come from your parents. 

Some parents don't have the ability to talk openly with their kids. Some beta spouses (sheep) don't have the ability to be in conflict with, or have independent thought from, the alpha.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

The only way to have a plan and not have a plan at the same time would be if their initial plan was to not have a plan and they followed through on it.

Boru

[fredd bear]

Not really sure what you're asking.

I 'm pretty good at setting goals, but not always so good at achieving them. EG the statement " I want to save $5000 by the end of this year" is a gaol, not a plan. The plan includes exactly what I will do t meet my goal. When I do that, I usually meet the goal, although not always. Procrastination is one of my major life skills.

I think it's common for people to not know exactly how to make plans. By that I mean they may set unrealistic amounts of work or too little time. Not sure it's at all practical to try to plan some things, such as rearing a child. When I fail to meet a goal, the problem tends to be me, rather than my plan.

I learned how to make plans as part of a business course I did. The book used was "Management By Objectives" by Peter Drucker. In essence he said it's far easier to reach a major a goal by breaking it into smaller parts, where the gaol is achievable, and practical planning is relatively easy.

[bennyboy]

I realized a long time ago that if you're of normal intelligence, the best path to success is:
(1)  analyze you current state
(2)  decide how you want to change it
(3)  make steps to do it
(4) do them
(5) repeat 1-4

In my experience, there are a lot of things that can go wrong along the way.  

You might find that on paper, certain steps are obvious, but in practice, they are so abhorrent to you that you must struggle internally to go through with them.  For example, your goal might be to make X$ / year, and you know that lawyers on average make that much.  But to get into law, you need a Bachelor's Degree, so you enroll in university.  Then you find yourself falling asleep in class because it's all just so damned boring.  Now, you've got $50k in debt and you'd rather slit your wrists than attend another Legal Ethics class or whatever.  Bad situation to be in. You made a mistake-- not considering the kind of life you want WHILE chasing that pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

You might find that intermediary goals are necessary, and get so entrenched in mastering them than you never get on to the next step.  For example, before going to school, you need to save say $100k.  You decide to save $12k / year for 8 years.  But in doing that, you realize that to save that much you'll need a small business of some kind, so you invest a few thousand in renting a small food truck.  Then 5 years later, you have your food truck business going pretty well, but you can't bring yourself to step away and restart as a college student.

But for me, by far (like a million times), the biggest problem is procrastination.  Believe me, Godot never comes.  If you aren't excited about jumping out of bed and taking the first step on your path in life today, right here, right now, you won't.  "The new school year starts next September, so I think I'll start researching after Easter" or whatever is fail; the correct time to start is always right now. The solution for this, by the way, is not to save up your psychic energy until you can trigger a major event-- it's to make very small and achievable goals every day. If you really have nothing going on, start with making your bed as soon as you get out of it every day, and visiting a new cafe for your morning coffee. Then add new little goals. It doesn't take long to get the ball rolling and feel "Hey. . . now I have some good momentum, I think I'm ready to tackle that bigger job."


One hint: a great way to learn what you need to do is to ask someone.  People will often answer questions that they aren't technically required to answer-- but they will VERY often answer them anyway, or put you in touch with someone who can.  For example, when you go in to get your first student loan payment, ask your banker "What steps do you think I need to take to get to a place where I can make $100k / year?"  You might be surprised to find that the banker herself does, and that she can recommend a more realistic or more enjoyable path than the one you had in mind.  She might also look at your financials and have some little-known bursaries or scholarships that she can recommend you apply for.  Really, it's amazing how much you can learn if you just ask people to give you information.

Or, when you meet your new teacher on their first day of class: "What will I need to do in your class to get an A?  If I slip up on a couple tests, is there anything I might do for extra credit?  I REALLY want an A, can I visit your office every week to get your advice?"

Or, better yet, BEFORE you apply at a school, go in and ask professors at the school exactly what you can do to maximize your chances of acceptance. How much do they weight extra-curriculars vs. grades? And GET NAMES of professors, so during your application interview, you can say, "I talked to Professor Brady, and she was so nice that I've already read her book. I hope that I'll be able to take her classes when I get to 2nd year." You'd be surprised how often human relationships can trump little things like a B average


--edit--
Holy crap, I just realized I'm writing my next book!

[Rahn127]

You can have general plans without having specific plans.

I plan to drive around the city and do some errands.
I know that as I'm driving around, I'll stop at other stores I hadn't planned on stopping at.

A general plan doesn't need to include specific plans.

Also having a specific plan doesn't mean that it can't be amended on the fly.