Risks are a Fact of Life: Take More of Them

I loved the show “Person of Interest” and there is this scene where two of the main characters are caught in a situation where they are losing badly against the main enemy. The lead character is playing it safe but his friend goes on to say: 

“Our only option is to take risks. Big ones. We have to be willing to do whatever it takes now or we’ve already lost. It’s No Risk, No reward.”

It’s interesting when I play back all my decisions in my life and career. I cannot lie that I don’t regret anything. I regret many things and they all stem from being too careful and not taking any risks in my life. All for fear of looking stupid, fear of failure or being rejected.  

The girls I should have approached and asked out in high school or University. The jobs or companies in my career I should have aimed for. The investments I should have done. The apologies I should have made before it was too late. So many regrets & so many questions. 

And in retrospect so many of these risks were what we call asymmetric risks: defined as by Andy Liu: “Asymmetrical risk is the concept of taking a risk that will produce a return that far surpasses the risk taken. This is a really important concept that can change your quality of life greatly.“ Basically: Low downside but massive upside. 

Who knows where I would be in life now if I had been smarter and not played it safe. It’s not that I have anything to complain about. But still. Safe is Unsafe in our unstable world. This is why you have to take action. Do stuff. 

To quote the great Silicon Valley philosopher Naval Ravikant: 

"Asymmetric opportunities:

Invest in startups

Start a company

Create a book, podcast, video

Create a (software) product

Go on many first dates

Go to a cocktail party

Read a Lindy book

Move to a big city

Buy Bitcoin

Tweet."

Source: https://mobile.twitter.com/navalbot/status/1076568269685956617?lang=en

So the point: take more asymmetric risks in life. This way you will have less regrets & questions of “what might have been” in life. This is the only way you can truly live.