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Hey everyone! 👋 Today, let’s dive into the fascinating world of razors – the powerful mental tools to help make decisions in uncertain situations. I recently had the privilege of interviewing Sahil Bloom (🎧 Ep 116) for the second time.
In this post, I’ll highlight 10 mental razors you can use to make faster, better decisions with professional opportunities, personal growth, and how you spend your time. I’ll also highlight some of the benefits and limitations of each.
Sahil deserves much credit for his extensive writing on this topic, including developing some of the razors I’ll share today. Check out his newsletter: The Curiosity Chronicle, which shares two posts a week to build a high-performing, healthy, wealthy life.
A razor is a guiding principle or rule of thumb that aids decision-making when faced with uncertainty. It draws its concept from shaving off unnecessary complexity, enabling us to cut through the noise and make clear choices.
Similar to how life hacks optimize our routines to overcome overwhelm and inefficiencies, razors simplify decision-making by providing a framework to navigate the complexity and streamline our thought process. They serve as mental tools to help us separate the signal from the noise, allowing for more efficient and effective decision-making.
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The simplest explanation is often the best one
Occam’s Razor states that while the truth can occasionally be complex, there is no need to default to convoluted explanations when simpler alternatives exist.
Benefits:
Limitations:
By identifying the simplest explanation, you can save time, avoid mistakes fueled by false information, and evade unnecessary assumptions. However, it is essential to remember that simplicity does not always guarantee accuracy and to remain open to more complex explanations when warranted.
Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity
Hanlon’s Razor offers a powerful tool for understanding and resolving conflicts, particularly in the digital realm, where common misinterpretations occur.
Benefits:
Limitations:
Hanlon’s Razor emerges as a valuable razor, preventing misattributing others’ behavior to internal motivations when external factors are at play. Applying Hanlon’s Razor empowers us to navigate interpersonal dynamics with greater empathy, fostering healthier relationships and personal growth.
When choosing who to spend time with, prioritize spending it with optimists
The Optimist Razor recognizes the positive impact of the optimists mindset on outcomes. In a world where pessimists sound smart, the optimists seem to be the ones getting rich.
Benefits:
Ask yourself:
Limitations:
Surrounding ourselves with optimists fosters a sense of well-being, fuels our persistence, and attracts favorable outcomes. Seek out those who radiate optimism and positivity, for they have the potential to catalyze personal growth and an enriched life experience.
With two options of seemingly equal merit, choose the one that doesn’t look the part
The Look The Part Razor suggests choosing the option that doesn’t conform to the expected appearance. By opting for the candidate or solution that “doesn’t look the part,” we acknowledge that individuals who have overcome significant obstacles to success often possess more valuable qualities than those who fit the mold perfectly. This razor is attributed to writer, analyst, and former options trader Nassim Nicholas Taleb.
Benefits:
Limitations:
You can make more informed choices by acknowledging the limitations of appearances and seeking out individuals who have overcome significant challenges. However, it is crucial to remain aware of the potential for self-deception and understand the context in which this principle may or may not apply. Adopting the “Look the Part” principle empowers you to navigate decisions more clearly and effectively.
If someone proposes a seemingly crazy idea and they’re both a domain expert and reasonable, you should take the idea seriously
The Crazy Idea Razor provides a framework for discerning valuable insights from seemingly outlandish ideas. Inspired by Paul Graham, co-founder of Y Combinator, this razor helps people lean into concepts with asymmetric upside potential.
Benefits:
Limitations:
By leveraging this razor, you can navigate the noise, challenge biases, and uncover extraordinary prospects. However, it’s important to exercise sound judgment and remain aware of the limitations, ensuring a balanced and informed approach to evaluating these ideas.
When faced with two paths, choose the path that puts you in the arena—choose the path with real skin in the game.
The Man in the Arena Razor encourages us to choose the path that puts us in the arena – or has real skin in the game. It’s inspired by Theodore Roosevelt’s impactful speech on Citizenship in a Republic. It emphasizes the importance of being an active participant rather than a mere critic on the sidelines. While the arena may seem daunting, it’s where growth, understanding, and success await.
Benefits:
Limitations:
How to take negative feedback?
The internet can be a mean place. The Man in the Arena can attract pretty negative feedback. Sahil suggests that you default to empathy as the healthiest and best way to combat negativity. He points to happiness because happy people don’t intentionally attack others. So, when someone attacks you, something is likely putting them in a tough spot. You can choose to engage; that’s up to you.
We cultivate understanding, courage, and resilience by actively engaging in the arena. Embracing and learning from failures paves the way for personal growth and success. Choose the arena, embrace the challenges, and let the journey toward growth and achievement begin.
When faced with two options, choose the one that’s more difficult in the short-term
The Uphill Decision Razor is a powerful tool guiding us to choose the option that presents greater difficulty in the short term. This principle recognizes that opting for the tougher path often leads to substantial rewards in the long run. Sahil references Naval, who emphasizes overcoming our instinctive aversion to discomfort.
Benefits:
Limitations:
The Uphill Decision Razor emphasizes the value of hard work and resilience. We pave the way for long-term success and personal growth by embracing short-term challenges. However, it’s important to strike a balance and remain open to alternative strategies when warranted.
When choosing between two paths, choose the path with a larger serendipity surface area
The Serendipity Razor is a razor that proposes that you choose the path that has the greatest serendipity to increase your chances of valuable opportunities. It is based on the idea that the more people we meet, the more experiences we have, and the more we learn, the more likely we are to come across something that will help us achieve our goals.
Benefits:
Limitations:
The Serendipity Razor is a valuable mental model that enhances our chances of success by intentionally positioning ourselves for fortuitous encounters. However, it’s important to recognize that it’s not a guarantee of success and requires dedicated effort and time to put into practice. We unlock new connections, knowledge, and pathways to achieving our goals by embracing serendipity.
If you have a choice between entering two rooms, choose the room where you are more likely to be the dumbest one in the room
The Rooms Razor urges us to seek out environments where we feel uncomfortable and potentially find ourselves as the ‘dumbest’ person in the room. Deliberately placing ourselves in such situations opens doors to remarkable growth and learning opportunities.
Benefits:
Limitations:
How to navigate networking as the ‘dumbest’ person in the room?
The Rooms Razor propels us towards growth and personal development by immersing us in uncomfortable environments. By embracing discomfort and seeking out rooms where we may be the least knowledgeable, we embark on a transformative journey of learning and expansion.
When choosing between two paths, choose the path that places the highest appreciation on the value of your time
The Time Billionaire razor is a principle that emphasizes the importance of valuing and maximizing your time. It shifts the focus from monetary wealth to recognizing time as our most precious resource. Introduced by Graham Duncan, this concept highlights how individuals often fail to appreciate the value of their own time until it slips away.
As Sahil describes it, the essence of being a Time Billionaire lies in the awareness of the fleeting nature of time and finding fulfillment in the ordinary moments of daily life.
The American Time Use Survey provides a powerful visual representation of how people allocate their time throughout their lives. It serves as a reminder to consciously decide how we spend our time and with whom we choose to invest it. More importantly, it urges us to reflect on these findings and make deliberate choices that deviate from the patterns indicated by the data.
By embracing the Time Billionaire razor, we can gain a new perspective on the value of our time and proactively shape our lives to align with our priorities and aspirations.
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If you found this post enjoyable, you’ll love listening to my first conversation with Sahil (🎧 Ep 99). It’s all about seven questions everyone should ask when reflecting on the previous year (or quarter) and establishing goals for the new one, plus strategies, tips, and advice to increase your happiness, energy, and sense of fulfillment while decreasing your stress and anxiety.
If you have razors or mental shortcuts that you find effective, please tell me about them.
Thanks,
Chris
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by Chris Hutchins
Learn all the hacks to upgrade and optimize your life, money and travel – all while spending less and saving more.
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