First truth: Success is at least partially predicated on one's willingness to commit to a singular activity--and stay committed through time at the behest of choosing other options. By sheer will power of commitment alone, other people will drop out of the competition and your chances of reaching success will increase. Query whether the costs are worth it later. For now, the important point is that commitment over time does yield success, or at least, increase the chances of it.
Second truth: Figuring out what you're good at by trying a lot of different things, failing, and then revamping what you're trying to focus on new things (Trial and Error) will help yield success.
Ugly Truth: We might not want what we want. That is, we might only want the benefits and not the costs. For instance: education. We might love the idea(l) of becoming a highly educated person, highly revered, that is, but dislike the cost of school and the labor it takes. Who we truly are, that is, regardless of what we tell ourselves, comes out within a constrained system like this. Constraints matter, because they shape decisions.
Example. Men (and woman, okay) often have conversations about who they find attractive, and who they would desire to engage sexually with, if... Many of these statements follow a line that goes like this: "If there were no consequences, then . . ." The problem is that there are always consequences, and consciously disregarding them doesn't get rid of them. It might work to justify certain behavior "I slept with her but it didn't mean anything" means: "I slept with her but I consciously disregarded the consequences," which also means, "I slept with her but had no intentions of committing to her in any other way." Which also means, "I am really committed to you, even though I slept with her." Which makes you wonder what "committed to you" means.
Anyway, the distance at which we see our restraints, temporally, usually defines how seriously we'll take them.
And I'll go out on a limb and say that the distance with which we see potential benefits defines how seriously we'll take them. That simply means that we are very bad at holding simultaneous conflicting views of cost in our heads--we seek moral clarity and that means we see linear narrative about our actions. The lottery ticket is worth it today, because of the possible benefits (but when we analyze how much it costs per year if we bought it every day compared to the chance of winning, this perspective shifts).
So, commitment can yield success, and trial and error might yield success, too.
Which one yields more success, faster? Damned if I know.
"The lottery ticket is worth it today, because of the possible benefits (but when we analyze how much it costs per year if we bought it every day compared to the chance of winning, this perspective shifts)."
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure this is a good example. The expected value of a $1 lottery ticket is about negative 50 cents; that is, if you take into account the price of a ticket, chances of winning and amounts to be won, then buying even one single ticket isn't worth its price.
Hah, well, fair enough! I meant that, for most of us, one dollar per year, let's say, is worth the chance--from an emotional standpoint, it is, but from a numerical monetary standpoint, it is not as you've pointed out. However, the consistency of losing a dollar every day (if one were to play one dollar day for a year) is much more, and can be recognized as an emotional loss. That's probably why the lottery makers have the little scratch and win games.
ReplyDeleteNon-monetary utility definitely changes the picture, and is probably the most common reason for playing. The lottery-makers, whose utility is more or less identical with money, are fully aware of it. They're a pretty evil lot, lottery makers.
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