Quick snippets from my morning read on Monday, 19th October 2020
Read the full article: “A Few Rules“.
1. The person who tells the most compelling story wins. Not the best idea. Just the story that catches people’s attention and gets them to nod their heads.
2. Something can be factually true but contextually nonsense. Bad ideas often have at least some seed of truth that gives their followers confidence.
3. Behavior is hard to fix. When people say they’ve learned their lesson they underestimate how much of their previous mistake was caused by emotions that will return when faced with the same circumstances.
4. “Logic is an invention of man and may be ignored by the universe,” historian Will Durant says. That’s why forecasting is hard.
5. Henry Luce said, “Show me a man who thinks he’s objective and I’ll show you a man who’s deceiving himself.” People see what they want to see, hear what they want to hear, and view the world through the lens of their own unique life experiences.
6. Self-interest is the most powerful force in the world. Which can be great, because situations where everyone’s interests align are unstoppable; bad because people’s willingness to benefit themselves at the expense of others is so seductive.
7. Don’t expect balance from very talented people. People who are exceptionally good at one thing tend to be exceptionally bad at another, due to overconfidence and mental bandwidth taken up by the exceptional skill.
8. Skills also have two sides: No one should be shocked when people who think about the world in unique ways you like also think about the world in unique ways you don’t like.
Read the full list of rules from The Collaborative Fund.
