Predicting the Future is Impossibly Hard
Letting Go of ‘What Ifs’
Last year, I was devastated after bombing the “interview of my life” with a renowned tech company. It seemed like a missed opportunity to get my foot in the door of the tech industry and secure a job at any other company.
Instead, I accepted a different internship from a company that turned out to be the best summer experience of my life. I went to Los Angeles, met new life-long friends, learned countless lessons from mentors, and grew immensely.
Recently, the software industry has suffered some crazy setbacks, and the company that I bombed my interview with was hit hard, laying off almost all of its new graduates.
Looking back, I realized that bombing the interview was a blessing in disguise. Instead of being in a tough situation with a company that keeps laying off its employees, I had a good foundation built up from my summer internship that I could work with.
So, what’s the moral of the story?
Predicting the future is extremely difficult and we never know what the actual “optimal” path is.
Think about it this way. The future is inherently complex. Inside of all of this uncertainty, there are a countless number of factors that are impossible to identify and anticipate.
The butterfly effect is a perfect example of this. The idea is that the flapping of a butterfly’s wings in one part of the world can set off a chain reaction that ultimately leads to a hurricane in another part. What seems like the tiniest action can end up compounding into something huge.
Even if we could achieve the impossible and accurately understand all of the factors at play along with their potential impacts, there are still unforeseen developments that can completely alter the course of the future. It’s like aiming at a target that is constantly moving.
And to make matters even more challenging, different people have different opinions about what the “best” path forward is. This shows just how difficult it is to make decisions for ourselves, let alone a group of people.
So, how can we predict the future and identify the best path forwards? The short answer is we can’t. The only thing we can do is analyze our situation and hope for the best.
It all starts with acknowledging the complexity and uncertainty of the task at hand. We need to be willing to take calculated risks and remain flexible when things don’t go as planned.
Ultimately, we may never be able to say with absolute certainty that we’ve found the best path forward. That is why we should try our best, make locally optimized decisions based on the relevant factors we know, and move on when things don’t go our way.
But how do we make such decisions?
Making a locally optimized decision involves focusing on the most relevant factors and making the best decision we can with the available information.
- Define relevant factors: Identify what is important and use it as your decision-making criteria.
- Research your factors: Gather as much information as you can about the factors involved in your decision-making criteria.
- Compare options: Using the newfound information, evaluate each option and consider using a scoring system if needed.
- Make your decision: Make the best decision based on the information available and don’t second guess yourself.
Using these steps, we can do the best with what we have. Don’t spend any extra time dwelling on the other options or what could have been. We never know what the outcome would have been, so it’s best to move on and focus on the path ahead.
