i am trying to understand the meaning of multiple critical path. i obviously know the meaning of critical path but how can there be more than one? by definition isnt critical path only one? how come there are multiple?

see:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/pr...001226069.aspx

For each "path" without successors, the critical path is calculated for that path.

but i made sure in my schedule that everything other than the last task has a successor. so my project would not have multiple critical paths correct?

You are correct.