Concentrating on the Benefits

It is fairly easy for me to concentrate on what I'll lose in a given interaction, or behavior change, and not what I could gain.  Conversely, there are times when I'll focus almost solely on what I could gain and not on what I will lose, or how much I value that.  Just thinking about either side can amplify it cognitively, making it difficult to actually decide something--which has costs too!  So easy to get overwhelmed in the heat of decision, especially when we add in trying to forecast what others expect from us, or what we should do, and not strict material costs and benefits.

I'm sure you know someone who can't throw out a thing.  There's even a show about those folks, called Horders.  They never want to get rid of anything because they'd lose it, and can only see that.

I'm as sure that you know someone who has lost money on the stock market thinking that the value of a stock is much higher than current price, so buys in.  In fact the stock market goes through it's own iterations on this theme. Warren Buffett was the classic "value" investor, finding under-priced companies and investing, even when other investors would trade based on price changes alone, and not value (EPS, et al).  Who is right?  Well, people have made money both ways--the question is more about what you value most, long or short term gain.  If you value short term gain, you'll have to risk more because you want higher fluidity; you want price to go up, fast.  Mostly, when that happens, then, it is easy to over-value the stock, and hold, instead of selling, even though "everyone" knows that you should sell high.  The question remains: what is "high?"  That's why it makes sense to make rules and stick by them.  I will sell x stock when it hits 10 dollars, and then enter in that bet to a system that I cannot change easily.

Etc Etc.

Listen, it is a nice morning.  Healthy, chilly.  The cat's sitting on my gloves on the heater.  The window is open.  I've got an aloe plant.  A decent job.  A relatively good life.  I honestly don't have much to complain about.  I don't need to keep open every opportunity availability for the sake of feeling powerful.  I'm finally making choices that allow me to because more specialized at some level.  I do think that specializing in a handful of skills is vital to moving forward, however much I'm jealous of people that are good at many many things.

It has become easier to believe in the stability of the moment.  That's happened because I think more of consequences to my actions instead of the promise of what might be, what I might lose, mostly.   Go figure.  Anyway, cheers everyone.  Let's take a step forward together.