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Self-Serving Bias, An illustration to ponder, Pragmatic Philosophy

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Ryan Elliott
July 04, 2023

🍀 GETN LUCKY with Ryan Elliott

1. Quote about luck

2. An illustration to ponder

3. Philosophical Practice

4. An article I loved

1. Quote about luck

“Luck is something that every successful entrepreneur will tell you plays a huge role in the difference between success and failure. Many of those successful entrepreneurs will only admit this under duress, though, because if luck does indeed play such a huge role, then that seriously dents the image of the successful entrepreneur as an omniscient business genius.”

- Marc Andreessen

We all have a self-serving bias. And that is to be right. To be smart. To be a winner.

When things go our way, we attribute it to skill. Hard work. Determination. Our genius on display.

When things go against us, we attribute it to bad luck. Unfortunate. The market. The weather.

Understanding this self-serving bias is one of the first steps towards getting luckier.

2. An illustration to ponder

The first step is always the hardest. Starting a new business or developing a new habit. The start always seems daunting.

There’s always a learning curve to in any new venture. Stumble your way through the start.

Once you start making some progressions the steps become a little easier. Your skills begin to develop and new opportunities begin to present themselves.

3. Philosophical Practice

Sweeping the floor in our home needs to be weekly. At least. Just because you do it once, doesn’t mean you never have to do it again. The dust creeps in and settles. The longer you leave it, the worse it gets.

This is no different to our practice towards regulating and managing our emotions. Meditating, journalling, exercising, are all tools to be used to ‘sweep the floor’

Emotions like envy, jealousy, anger, guilt, anxiety and shame are all emotions that if you allow them to creep ini and settle, they will consume you.

Having a regularly practice and a framework to deal with these emotions is a way to ‘sweep the floor.’

For me, it’s stoicism. Reading and practicing the strategies from the ancient philosophy.

The practising is the key though.

4. An article I loved

We were focused on answering questions like, what is the problem? Do people care? Are people willing to engage? We didn’t need 120 features to answer those. And sometimes that means being comfortable having a suboptimal solution for the sake of validating a hypothesis in the short term.