What causes stress in your life. I imagine the list is long and we are all in a battle to cope with or manage the anxiety levels. We walk the dog each morning and just when it finally started getting light at 6:45 it was time to change the clock. Spring forward-why? We were very inconvenienced-really this is the type of thing that bothers retired folks. I was heartened to see that the European Parliament voted in landslide fashion to eliminate daylight savings time in 2021. Surprisingly each of the 28 member countries gets to decide if they are on “permanent summer or winter”. Sounds like more stress. I am also very stressed by March Madness. I am rooting for Gonzaga, I have Zag friends and the Bulldogs are our neighbors. The national pundits always pick on them for strength of schedule, that said, Gonzaga has made 20 NCAA appearances. They are in the Elite 8 again. If you fill out a bracket that creates more opportunity for failure. The odds of picking the first 49 games in the tournament is 1 in 562 trillion which happened this year and predicting a perfect 32 games it is 1 in 9.2 quintillion. If you work for Warren Buffett and pick a perfect sweet sixteen field, he will pay you $1 million per year for life. I am told winning that much money complicates life- I would like the opportunity to disprove that theory.
What are the chances, the odds, the prospects-what can go wrong or right. So many variables, we must set our sights on a goal and in an informed, realistic, hopeful manner push ahead. Tens of millions basketball fans filled out their brackets on line and although the most successive correct choices in the past had been 39. Why do people even try, what makes us buy lottery tickets in the face of the odds, or refuse to accept the worst prognosis of any serious health issue. I have a close friend who is besting the difficult hand he was dealt with the support of a world class medical community, family, friends and his tenacity. His outcomes are well described in this I had cancer.com quote, “I am too positive to be doubtful, too optimistic to be fearful. And too determined to be defeated. “ in regard to visionary goals, ”Elon Musk says ”when something is important enough, you do it even if the odds are not in your favor.” Build a rocket system and colonize Mars seems impossible but not in Musk’s vision. I like this as a possible explanation of why we test the odds, “and sometimes, against all odds, against all logic, we still hope.”
I realize hope is not a strategy but it explains a lot of human behavior. Enjoy your week end. Mike