Let me ask a rude question: What makes you so sure you want to "do good"? If you do, this would be a most unusual appetite. People do what they want for other reasons, and then they explain it to themselves and others as "doing good." The motivation to "do good" isn't a primary motive. How could it be? From where might it come ? To root that sort of motive in nature, one pretty much has to invent some form of moral realism; you must cross the "is" versus "ought" chasm. Now's not the time to address the moralistic illusion, but without the prior need to morally justify one's sense of seeking right, I think moral realism would appear the fantasy it is.

One tries to do right but ends up seeking status. Then one asks: how do I weaken or redirect my status seeking? That may seem the obvious problem, but then why would someone who is smart, studies rationality, and tries to apply his conclusions end up failing to achieve his goals?

I don't buy the cynical line of that Dirty Old Obfuscator Robin Hanson: that status is our primary drive. This is a transparent rationalization for its being his primary goal. There are more important drives, call it effectance, competence, or Nietzsche's "will to power." Even "self-actualization" may do in a pinch. You obviously haven't succeeded in engaging any deep interests (in the sense of "intellectual interests" not the sense of "source of comparative advantage.") As it looks to me, that's your problem. .

You're right, of course, that signaling status often distracts from what's productive. And perhaps everyone needs to work on being distracted less. Theoretically, this could be accomplished in one of two ways. One might 1) observe the environmental triggers for status-oriented thinking and decrease one's exposure to them; or 2) find ways to gratify status striving through the objectively more valuable activity. Only 2 seems to have been discussed, but I think it's less important; even, unworkable. The problem is that indulging status drives, like most nonhomeostatic (appetitive) drives, increases their strength. If you recognize status seeking as a distraction, you're probably better off limiting your exposure to what precipitates it. (Serving as head of a political party is certainly well-calculated to be an effective trigger of status seeking.)

But, while these elements of truth impart to your analysis a sense of truthiness, they don't apply to your situation as you describe it. You weren't merely distracted; you directly subverted your own goals. No situationist tinkering will address a problem that really lies elsewhere. The problem is, it seems to me, that you are so concerned with what you "should do," ethically speaking, that either you don't recognize your intellectual interests or you refuse to follow them.

It is easy to become intellectually enchanted with an idea, whether the Singularity, the Pirate Party, or (for that matter) a religious ideal. But this doesn't mean you believe it with the certainty that your intellect claims. Your balking at the goals you set yourself suggests that beneath your conscious intellect, you are at best indifferent to them; I would go further and say you're probably downright hostile to your professed goals.