Not taking a risk is a risk. That’s how I see it.
Yes, opportunity cost is also a cost.
Sure. It’s about balancing risks, what the business world calls Risk Mitigation (there’s an entire field(s) called Risk Analysis and Management)
We always ask “what’s the risk?” Both for making a given change or not making it. We then attempt to asses which risk is more manageable - which can be “mitigated”.
We have teams whose job it is to analyze the usentied risks, and try to quantify them to enable decision making.
Right, and the flip side of this is roughly opportunity cost.
Assess the risk, and potential benefits, of every action, where nonaction is… also an action.
If you ‘do nothing’, and others ‘do something’, and the net result is you are now comparatively worse off than others… well then, your inaction has made you comparatively worse off.
You can use that logic in stock portfolios, business strategies, or ‘should i evacuate after the tsunami warning?’.
We tried growing trees in glass domes and they grew so good. Like damn. Nothing to challenge them.
But oops. Brittle as fuck. They hadn’t even been exposed to wind.
Friction is necessary for sturdy growth.
Take the risk. Failure is ultimately better than complacency.
Wow. I’ve never considered why we don’t do this and it’s amazing it works out to such a beautiful metaphor.
You can find it kind of more meaningfully in folks who accomplish crazy things recounting their trials.
One guy who swam the English channel like a couple dozen times explained, from memory
…that you have to start at night to avoid freightliners. So you swim toward blackness. And like 4 hours in, youve accidentally drank so much seawater, you’re vomiting. Not sure which way is back to safety. Might as well press on.
And later the sun breaks the sky and it feels like relief even though there’s still no land in sight and your limbs are cramping.
And the feeling of swimming to shore, getting your feet underneath you on solid ground… Addicted. Like speed running a whole emotional lifetime overnight.
Do the hard thing. Take off the guardrails. Press on through the night. The sun will rise. Find solid ground.
As a response to the saying … “Fuck around and find out” …
A Canadian YouTube mechanic said … “If you don’t Fuck around, how are you ever going to find out?”
“You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.” -
Wayne GretzkiMichael Scott–John Halo
This is a good insight that has wide application. For example in the context of investing: every portfolio is always fully invested, even 100% cash which runs the risk of not meeting the investor’s goals.
However it’s not always true in all contexts. For example in formal games, there may be a no-risk path to victory for you, where every move can be dominant. In this sense there is no risk in taking those dominant moves to win the game.
