Knowing what you want is extremely complicated

Because most things you don’t have — you don’t have for a reason

That reason is the cost

And that cost itself often comprises multiple variables

And of course the very value, the reward — often comprises multiple variables too

 

It is useful then to reason from analogy

E.g. if something else has similar cost — is it more valuable than that thing, or less?

That could help unravel inconsistencies in your perception of the value

 

Another trick would be to strip the parts,

You can strip the costs,

You can strip the benefits,

You can consider many different configurations

You can consider what would be the highest price you’d be willing to pay for that thing

Or maybe what extra feature, benefit, would justify that price for you

Or maybe which features you’d first get rid of, to hopefully lower the price

 

This can be particularly enlightening

Often we’d really like something just for a certain number of features,

And we’d really take it — if only we could get those features at a lowered cost

 

Again: If you can’t decide if you want something — decide at what costs would you like it

Then try to get it then, at this lowered cost

You can no longer say it costs you too much, it asks too much from you

 

Too often we take a cop-out and just say that “it’s not worth it”, or even worse we say “we don’t really want it”

and yet if it was given to us for free — we’d take it immediately

 

Free means also “without consequences”

In life it’s the CONSEQUENCES which are often the highest cost

Not time, not energy, and often not money

It’s the whole of the consequences

 

So imagine that same thing WITHOUT consequences

Wouldn’t you take it then?

And then consider again — are those consequences really so bad? That you’re refusing to take that thing, because of that?

And if so — what are the minimal consequences, the minimal price you’d be willing to pay, for that thing, after all?

 

Of course sometimes it will go the other way

You imagine EVERYTHING BUT the consequences

And then when the consequences hit you — you fold rapidly

Except you didn’t even get the reward!

So often you put yourself in a worse risk-reward situation — you took the risk, suffered the consequences, and got nothing in return

That’s because you didn’t consider the consequences

You didn’t consider the true costs

 

Be more thoughtful

 

Finally, look for asymmetries

You preferably want finite cost — huge reward

This is obviously true in business

But it’s likewise true in life

 

You should regard everything in a similar vain:

-try to confine the risks, the costs

-while exposing yourself to massive, open-ended reward, potential, optionality

 

We often don’t do that

We often get into a quagmire from which it’s so hard to extricate oneself — and barely get anything in return

This is how you get stuck

 

Again, REDUCTION OF PARTS helps

This is how you limit costs

The features can maybe be added later

What matters is that you get the value already

And value begets value

Ergo asymmetry

 

It’s also often necessary

What does “impossible” even mean?

That the costs are too high. “Impossibly” high

Well then you have to get rid of the impossible costs

Easier said than done

But at least you’re being creative

If you just settled on this being impossible — then that would have been that

 

The amount of value you can get at low cost is quite dazzling

Our problem is that we take the PRICE LABEL as the truth

So the best bargains elude us because we think them being discounted, available, abundant — means them being inferior

How much more would you appreciate your smartphone if you had to pay millions for it? Computers used to cost millions, you know?

How much would you have paid for an intelligent computer that’s passing the fucking Turing test? If you had millions you would have gladly paid millions, 10 years ago

 

This is also why removing the “price” side of the equation helps,

It puts things in perspective

You realise what you actually value, irrespective of how others value it

 

Therefore always tinker with the input and the output

See what you can get with less input

See what you can get with more input

See what given output costs in input

Consider the myriad of permutations, different inputs, different outputs, and outputs feeding into inputs

We don’t do that, in life, OR in business, not nearly enough

 

What are those who get better outcomes, better outputs, even doing better?

They merely have slightly different inputs that they feed into different processes

Be 10 and 100 times more creative with your inputs and where you input them

Break everything into parts, strip it to naked essentials

Again: works as well in engineering as it does in life

Not willing to accept the impossible is not always naivety — often it’s just creativity. The very meaning of this world. You’re creating new reality, with your ingenuity

 

Business, engineering, psyche, it’s all input-output, it’s all risk-reward, it’s all cost and value you get out of it

And all of those are subject to the same biases

To the same inaccuracy, miscalculation

So before you say you want something,

or before you say you can’t have something,

first do the fucking math