You Shouldn't Take Advice From Those Who Are Successful

All too often I stumble upon people who seem to be fascinated with the success of others. It seems logical that if someone is successful, then following that person's strategy, would also bring success to you. Thing is, life doesn't work like that. In fact, you would have had the same luck taking money advice from someone who just won the lottery.

Crows, much like humans, are pretty intelligent beings if they are trained under a specific context. If you doubt their ingenuity then check this out. Crows are also known to be simpletons — they pretty much collect everything that blinks. We might consider crows silly for not knowing any better but we are not that much different. Crows possess an innate jerk reaction to anything that reflects light. Humans have a similar reaction when confronted with societal memes that involve someone flashing money, driving an expensive car or wearing a fancy suit.

Part of the reason we are often rendered emotionally handicapped to these societal memes is because we suck at making logical deductions. People don't just hate math for no reason. Logical thinking goes against our nature. Humans function primarily on an emotional autopilot. Thinking is hard and takes energy so the brain tends to avoid it. This is also why the decisions we take tend to be emotional rather than logical.

For example, you have the same odds for winning the lottery as with a tiny asteroid landing on your right testicle. Yet, people keep playing over and over again. There is a saying that the lottery is a form of tax for stupid people. People see the advertised winner and forget the millions of people that didn't win. In other words we pay attention to the wins and forget the losses.

Most gamblers think much the same. Most traders think much the same (sure, not you). Most positive thinkers carry the same false mentality. All it matter are the wins. The losses are ignored. Thing is, in a world that is governed by demand and supply the losses will be always far greater than the wins. Although there is no such thing as zero sum game, the overall relative gap of wealth will always increase due to competition and the nature of value. In other words, losers will always be more than the winners. Much more. Relative value exists because of this uncanny unbalance.

Many people that read the Warren Buffet books or Steve Jobs autobiographies, believe that if they follow their ways they will too become successful. Statistically speaking, the exact opposite is true. Buffet became Buffet because he had a unique set of circumstances aligned for him. His father owned a brokerage and he could also have a good strike in a couple deals. Then everything after that rolled out effortlessly. Whatever move he was making, whatever strategy, could be explained as a post-hoc event. Thousands and thousands of traders followed Warren Buffet's classic strategy but not all made it. In fact most got owned because they created a predictable trend in their trading strategies and others ripped them off.

This phenomenon is easily demonstrable when it comes to popular videos and news. We are showered every day by the top million views-popular videos, forgetting we are witnessing the extreme exception to the rule. The exception, in our eyes, becomes our norm. Self-help gurus like Tony Robbins know this trick very well. This is why they only flash the followers that made it. This form of confirmation bias plagues humanity in more instance that I can enumerate.

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The crashing majority of people don't do anything wrong. Even if they follow the books, lives and advice of successful people, they simply don't make it. Their child might have caught an illness and changed their venture's prospects. A boss might have just promoted their relative. A physical injury might have stopped progress. Heck, one might have stained their tie by mistake causing them to lose the jackpot deal of their life that could have made them the next George Soros. If anything of those events had rolled out for the better, the post-hoc narrative would have changed along.

Most people hate the idea that life is mostly about luck because losing control is scary. The fact of the matter is that life is mostly luck. You can even demonstrate this to yourself. Take a note and start writing down all the small events happening around you, along with the potential outcomes. In an hour, so many things affect you in your vicinity that you could have written a book.

Your daily life involves trillions of micro-events that together create your own unique future. A small change can make you win the lottery or leave you paralyzed for life. The control we have on events in our life are extremely limited. Life is highly unpredictable. If you believe that something bad is unlikely to happen due to a statistical impossibility then why would you think otherwise about becoming a millionaire?

Following the lives of others is not only silly but is also damaging. If for example everyone starts copying Buffet's investing strategy then someone with an opposing game can screw everyone over. In fact much of financial fraud in trading happens exactly like this. Moreover you are not them. You will never be them. Trying to take advice from a person that has lived a different set of events is futile. One cannot get the same outcomes in their life. It is statistically improbable due to the collusion of a myriad of other factors. It is similar to copying the training regime of Usain Bolt in hope to become the fastest man alive.

I wrote this article because I see some celebrities here on Steemit who "made it" advertising their success. It is only logical that even if everybody followed the same strategy, nobody would be successful. Everyone would ultimately be in the same position thus the perceived value of that action/s would have rendered them all useless.

The "Look at me/Be like me" success stories are nothing but self-loathing narratives that people use to market themselves. The primary usage is for them to make even more money by having common simpletons (that do not understand statistics) follow them. They have no basis in reality and can turn your excitement into dire disappointment. It's your life. You are in control. Prefer to ignore the flashy folk. Most likely they are so full of themselves that when the tides turn, they won't know what hit them. Even if you still don't believe in luck, she has her own way of proving you wrong.