The Psychology of...

Yes. Yes he or she is. The end. Now what does that mean? The term was coined by Nassim Taleb who had this to say in his book entitled "Antifragile" "Some things benefit from shocks; they thrive and grow when exposed to volatility,  randomness , disorder, and stressors and love adventure,  risk , and  uncertainty . Yet, in spite of the ubiquity of the phenomenon, there is no word for the exact opposite of fragile. Let us call it antifragile. Antifragility is beyond resilience or robustness. The resilient resists shocks and stays the same; the antifragile gets better" Things that are antifragile gain strength when exposed to struggle, resistance, and shock. A glass vase is fragile. A plastic replica is much more resistant to force, but it does not grow stronger from dropping it. The human will; the human spirit; the human mind; on the other hand, grows stronger with every blow. We teach our kids that they are fragile by explicitly removing risks that they are...

"Too many people spend money they haven't earned, to buy things they don't want, to impress people they don't like." - Will Rogers So in the modern world we're supposed to work hard, earn money, and then buy happiness. Sounds good, I mean what better way to spend our money than on our happiness and that of those around us? The problem is that we are terrible happiness investors. We buy products thinking they will increase our well-being but most of our belongings lose their luster within hours of being unpackaged. So what do we do? We go out and buy more things to fill the human shaped hole in our hearts. How can we be so foolish? Well marketers are very smart. They know that the utility of their product does not have enough value to make a profit so they need to imbue their 'good' with magical powers that help you signal to other people some kind of trait or virtue. We don't just buy things, we buy stories that help use define one of our ow...

"Prepare your child for the road, not the road for the child." Is there anything more terrifying than the idea of your child suffering? As you observe the storms of rage and intolerance in the world you engineer your child's safety within the walls of your home. It might be harsh out there but under your watch you will do everything you can to ensure the safest and most caring environment possible. Then you send your kids to school, to play, to work, and eventually to permanently move out. How do you know they're ready for the "world". You worry that perhaps they aren't, so you venture into the storm to forge a path for them by advocating for safer spaces, nicer societies, and less allergens. That should do it right? But you discover that "out there" people disagree with your view of how society is supposed to be. Out there, the safe path that you have blazed crosses with alternate paths towards conflicting ideals of utopia. Your heaven...