Weekly Question & Framework: October 11, 2024

Hello and welcome to the Curiosity Chronicle Weekly Question and Framework. In three minutes or less, I'll give you one question and one framework to get you thinking going into the weekend. Without further ado, let's dive right into it. A question to Find More Happiness how can you decide to be happy today? I recently came across a story about happiness that I love. The 92 year old, petite, well poised and proud lady who is fully dressed each morning by 8am with her hair fashionably coiffed and makeup perfectly applied even though she is legally blind, moved to a nursing home today after many hours of waiting patiently in the lobby of the nursing home. She smiled sweetly when told her room was ready. As she maneuvered her walker to the elevator, I provided a visual description of her tiny room, including the eyelet sheets that had been hung on her window. I love it. She stated with enthusiasm of an eight year old having just been presented with a new puppy. Mrs. Jones, you haven't seen the room. That doesn't have anything to do with it. Happiness is something you decide on ahead of time. That final line bears repeating. Happiness is something you decide on ahead of time. Every single morning you have a decision. You get to decide how to perceive the world. You can decide to focus on things outside your control and drive yourself crazy. Or you can decide to focus on things within your control and let the rest fall into place. No matter what opportunities, challenges or chaos arise, each day is a fresh start, a fresh decision to make. So how can you decide to be happy today? A framework to consider your exposure the Ludic Fallacy in his 2007 best selling book the Black Swan, author Nassim Taleb proposes the ludic fallacy as the common mistake of applying simply simplified models or frameworks to predict or explain highly complex real world scenarios. He brings the idea to life with a simple thought experiment. There are two participants of a coin toss Dr. John, a respected expert in the field of statistics and Fat Tony, a fast talking street smart real estate agent. Taleb tells the two that each toss is independent and the coin is fair. He will flip the coin 99 times and then ask them to guess the outcome of the hundredth flip. Taleb flips the coin 99 times and each of the 99 tosses comes up heads. He asks them to estimate the probability of a heads on the hundredth flip. Dr. John answers that it is 50% because he has been told the coin is fair and each toss is independent. Fat Tony is incredulous and answers that the game is clearly rigged so the next toss is 100% likely to be heads. The point of the thought experiment is that an academic, rigid mind may be blinded by the notion that the game should conform with the models, while the realist will focus on experience rather than the models. Taleb uses an example from the combat sports world to bring the perils of the ludic fallacy to organized competitive fighting trains the athlete to focus on the game and, in order to not dissipate his concentration, to ignore the possibility of what is not specifically allowed by the rules, such as kicks to the groin, a surprise knife, etc. So those who win the gold medal might be precisely those who will be most vulnerable in real life. Operating under the assumption that the theoretical models will always hold up in reality is a dangerous way to live, as it exposes you to certain risks that the models may fail to predict. It's always going to be easy to set aside low probability events and fail to adequately prepare for them in your personal or professional life. But take a few moments to consider where you may be exposed and how you might navigate the chaos should the model you've relied on fundamentally break. A little bit of preparation can go a long way. That's all for today's piece. I hope you enjoyed it. I hope you learned something and I hope you'll share it with others. If you if you did enjoy this, you're going to love my debut book, the Five Types of Wealth. You can preorder it today on Amazon or anywhere books are sold or go to the five Types of Wealth. Com. Thank you. And as always, until next time, stay curious friends.