Personal Growth

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How the “Butterfly Effect” Might Be Shaping Your Entire Life

Sinem Günel
Personal Growth
Published in
8 min readApr 29, 2022

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Photo by Los Muertos Crew from Pexels

Did you ever wonder whether your existence matters? Whether your birth was a complete coincidence or if your death would lead to a change?

If your answer is yes, the butterfly effect could help you find answers and make sense of your life. At least in some ways.

The butterfly effect was first formulated by American meteorologist and mathematician Edward Lorenz in the 1960s.

His theory claims that even a tiny change in the starting of an event (such as the flutter of a butterfly) could lead to drastic differences in the outcome of the particular event.

Lorenz initially discovered the effect while doing weather forecasts.

To test weather predictions, he would enter data into the computer and check the results. He assumed leaving out one decimal point from the original number wouldn’t make a difference when making forecasts.

He believed these differences would be so small (like the flutter of a butterfly’s wings) that they couldn’t have an impact.

Yet, he was wrong.

Even tiny differences led to tremendous changes in the forecasts.

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Personal Growth
Personal Growth

Published in Personal Growth

Practical wisdom for life drawn from philosophy, psychology, spirituality and personal experiences.

Sinem Günel
Sinem Günel

Written by Sinem Günel

Digital Writer, Entrepreneur & Educator. I help you build a business you love. Grab 15 Writing Tips for Faster Growth: https://mwa.kit.com/15tips