Cory Richards shocked the world when he abruptly ended his climbing career at the foot of Dhaulagiri in 2021. He is ready to tell his story.
Continue reading “Cory Richards: The Color of Everything”Cory Richards: The Color of Everything
The Illusion of Skill and How to Make Better Predictions
Imagine being faced with the daunting task of predicting the future with nothing but incomplete information and a handful of hunches. Perhaps you’re considering new experiences, like travel or moving to a different town. When I imagined quitting my job, I envisioned a happier world, free from the perceived burden of corporate work. In the following months, however, my expectations were shattered upon realizing that I still largely felt the same despite my newfound freedom. In recent years, this recognition has remained vivid, sparking my curiosity about why predicting outcomes in the face of uncertainty is so difficult.
Whether anticipating a geopolitical event, forecasting stock market trends, or simply contemplating life’s next move, accurate prediction is an ever-present challenge. As I began to journal in earnest some years ago, I uncovered a fascinating trend hidden between the mundane details: my predictions were fraught with overblown concern and startling inaccuracy. Delving into the complexities of prediction and expertise, it becomes clear that many factors—from biases and cognitive distortions to the whims of randomness—shape our perceptions of certainty and accuracy. Despite these hurdles, new research offers a glimmer of hope.
Continue reading “The Illusion of Skill and How to Make Better Predictions”A Therapist on Satisfaction in Sport, Life, and Love
If you haven’t noticed, the concept of achievement and even competitiveness has weighed heavily on my mind as of late. A gift of the nontraditional life is the opportunity to step back and see the world around us with a degree of unusual clarity, far from the treadmill. For years I valued athletic and professional progress in ways that weren’t making my life better, but I thought they were. I searched for and implemented solutions to the wrong problems. Meanwhile, what truly mattered—mainly my relationships—withered on the vine. The journey toward rectifying these tendencies continues today.
My guest today, Lincoln Stoller, is a former mountaineer who now specializes in psycho-, hypno-, and neurofeedback therapy, in tandem with numerous other counseling and coaching services. Lincoln holds a PhD in Theoretical and Mathematical Physics from UT Austin, including a post-doc assignment at UC Berkley. Lincoln eventually moved from quantum physics to create a management and automation software platform for businesses, learned to build Norwegian log homes, traveled and lived abroad in far-flung foreign lands, and is even a certified pilot. To say Lincoln lives well outside of the bounds of normalcy is probably a half-truth at best. As he says in the interview, we should “just keep doing out-of-the-box stuff. And if people aren’t calling you a little crazy or a little nutty, then you probably aren’t exploring enough of the boundaries.”
Today’s conversation revolves around the high-risk potential of hard-charging performers and achievers, whether they exist in sports, business, or other areas of life. While these individuals hold our collective attention and admiration, Lincoln outlines how their psychological roots run shallow. They often struggle to stay satisfied with themselves or those around them. Lincoln might even say he holds an anti-hard-man philosophy. I think you’ll see why.
Continue reading “A Therapist on Satisfaction in Sport, Life, and Love”The Psychology Behind Poor Investments and Other Important Decisions
When we make important decisions, we are often not as rational or objective as we’d like to believe. The base rate fallacy is the tendency to misjudge the probability of a situation by not accounting for all relevant information. This cognitive bias affects everything from first impressions to voting preferences to broad market behavior.
Continue reading “The Psychology Behind Poor Investments and Other Important Decisions”The Problem with Bucket Lists and How to Be Happy with Less
It’s often said that happiness equals what you have minus (or sometimes divided by) what you want. When our wants are many, what we have is of little consequence. That is why there are hordes of unhappy millionaires and high achievers who quietly suffer (yes, suffer) under the weight of lofty and insatiable desires and ambitions. Western ideals place great importance on the “haves.” And despite an anecdotal feeling that my greater social circle is less materialistic, I’m less certain that we’ve diminished our appetite for having things. The things look and feel different. Less like fancy watches or cars or gaudy showings of riches and more like spreadsheets full of countries and crags unvisited, food not tasted, status not yet achieved, or routes not sent. We believe subconsciously or otherwise that by checking items off our bucket list we will arrive at some sense of blissful satisfaction. But biology and evolution suggest otherwise.
Continue reading “The Problem with Bucket Lists and How to Be Happy with Less”The Anticipation Of The Thing Is Greater Than The Thing
We are prone to believing that outcomes will have stronger emotional impacts on us than they often do. This state of expectation, or impact bias, highlights why anticipation of an event is a much more palpable emotion than the event itself. The impact bias can lead to behaviors that make us less content despite our best efforts for happiness.
Let’s learn more about how to recognize this bias and make better decisions for our future.
Continue reading “The Anticipation Of The Thing Is Greater Than The Thing”This is the Wild Ride We Signed Up For
To date, 2022 has been a bad year for the stock market. As long-term investors, this is the wild ride we signed up for.
Continue reading “This is the Wild Ride We Signed Up For”I Was Really Fat Until I Fixed It
There was a time when I was fat.
Not “athlete fat,” where you’d like to drop five or ten pounds — I’m talking about obese.
As I write this, I weigh 148 pounds. In Peak Blubber days, circa 2001 (age 17), I weighed approximately 240 pounds. And there was no muscle to speak of.
Over a 10-15 year period, I eradicated nearly 100 pounds of excess mass from my body — and along with it— the shame, disgust, and self-loathing from my mind.
Continue reading “I Was Really Fat Until I Fixed It”Know Thyself: A Guide To Individuality
The concept of conformity involves changing one’s behavior to “fit in” or otherwise not stand out. It’s human nature; there’s a lot of comfort in being part of the herd and going with the flow. But when it comes to many of life’s endeavors, aligning ourselves with the “average person” may be detrimental to our future. Below we outline ways to find your sense of individuality and to know thyself…
Continue reading “Know Thyself: A Guide To Individuality”