"Should You Stick to Your Own Ideas? This Method Can Inspire You"

This article is Lu Canwei's 120th original piece.

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Today, I open-sourced a project from last year, which counts as the Nth project I've worked on. Many times, the things we do seem futile, but after persistence, we can always welcome something different.

Stick to Your Views

I wonder if everyone uses Zhihu; there’s something called the hot list, similar to Weibo's trending topics, where various answers are pushed to the forefront through the wisdom of the people, like the recent meme "2.08 million equals 1."

Since it relies on the wisdom of the people, it can only accumulate slowly before it explodes. We are the same; many things may not show results at the moment, but with the power of compound interest, one day it might just make the hot list.

Is this a bit too motivational? Let’s look at an example from the hot list:

You can see that this question was initially added on the 18th, then edited by someone on the 24th, stating that the term "Huawei" contains subjective judgment. On the 25th, it was edited again to restore the original question, then edited again to remove "Huawei," claiming a lack of credible sources, and then edited yet again to add "Huawei" back, after which it started trending.

Even for a single question, there are different opinions; let alone our decisions. There will definitely be people who disagree with us. If we firmly believe in our views, regardless of right or wrong, we ultimately take responsibility ourselves, rather than following others' decisions. Only then can we truly be ourselves. Just like in the previous example, others felt there was an issue and edited it, but in the end, it proved that the initial description wasn’t significantly wrong.

Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

So can I just persist?

I wonder if anyone else feels this way: sometimes, you suddenly feel inspired and think you can accomplish anything, but after some time without positive feedback, coupled with some negative feedback from those around you, you start to feel like it’s not working, and eventually, it really doesn’t.

In psychology, there’s a term called "self-fulfilling prophecy," introduced by American sociologist Robert K. Merton. It refers to a social psychological phenomenon where people's preconceived judgments, whether correct or not, will more or less influence their behavior, leading to the realization of that judgment. In simple terms, a self-fulfilling prophecy means we often inadvertently make our own predictions come true.

All our results are based on previous actions. For example, if I’m hungry, then I eat, and then I’m full. From this example, we conclude:

Example: A (hungry) → B (eat) → C (full)

Behavior Logic: A (cause) → B (action) → C (result)

So according to this logic, can we continue to trace back? If being hungry is the result, then what are B and A?

Example: A (a friend invites me to play basketball) → B (play basketball) → C (hungry)

We might derive the above example. If we keep deducing, can we predict the future? Every event has a cause and effect. If I persist in smoking, my probability of getting cancer is higher than others; this is the cause-and-effect relationship between smoking and cancer.

If I persist in wanting to make money, then according to the self-fulfilling prophecy, I should definitely be able to earn money. I can only say there’s a certain probability. For instance, if I just eat, drink, and lie around every day, and then I want to make money, what do you think the probability is?

Here lies a contradiction: is the self-fulfilling prophecy reliable? If one day you suddenly meet your future self, and that future self tells you that you will become a wealthy person, and you start to indulge in fantasies of sudden wealth, but in the end, you still have nothing, would you say that prophecy is unreliable?

It’s like playing Werewolf. As a seer, you check a certain person and then say everyone should vote to eliminate them, and we will win. However, many times, players do not act according to your prophecy but based on the current situation, leading to a loss. Yet, even if we follow the prophecy and eliminate that person, we might still lose the game. Before the outcome, we experience more than one cause and effect.

This means that a result is produced by multiple causes. So returning to the earlier question, should we stick to our views? The views themselves may not have significant issues, but the actual results are produced by my actions, not by the views.

Example 1: A (I want to make money) → B (go to work) → C (receive salary)

Example 2: A (I want to make money) → B (not in a hurry, let’s talk about it tomorrow, let’s sleep a bit more) → C (continue wanting to make money)

So is it okay if I only focus on B (action)? Let’s look at another example:

Example 1: A (I don’t want to make money) → B (lying at home) → C (continue not making money)

Only the correct views and correct actions can lead to the results we desire.

Decision Tree

So how do we know if we are right, or likely to be right?

Here, I’ll borrow a predictive model from machine learning, the decision tree. Here’s a snippet from Wikipedia:

Let’s use an example. Xiao Hai is a player who is pursuing both girl A and girl B. Today, he unexpectedly receives a vacation package to the Maldives. At this moment, he is troubled about whether to invite girl A or girl B.

He checks the weather there; there’s a 30% chance of rain and a 70% chance of no rain. If it doesn’t rain, they can go to the beach. If it rains, they can only stay in the hotel.

Girl A likes the beach and isn’t afraid of the sun, while girl B is afraid of the sun and isn’t very willing to stay at the beach for long. Girl A is quiet and requires someone to lead the conversation, while girl B is talkative and makes it easier for him.

When it doesn’t rain, whether or not she is afraid of the sun becomes the key to the decision.

When it rains, whether or not she is talkative becomes the key to the decision.

In the end, Xiao Hai chooses the girl with the better figure to go out and have fun.

Of course, the above is just a fictional example. When making decisions, we can use a decision tree to guide our choices. The information for the decision tree can be gathered from the decisions made by people who have achieved the desired results.

This might sound a bit convoluted, so let’s return to the example of wanting to make money. For instance, you ask 10 people who have made money, and from their experiences, you extract so-called "success factors" like needing to create information gaps, being replicable, low-cost, altruistic, proactive, etc., to serve as your decision points.

When you want to take a certain action, you can set up a checklist, then check off each item one by one, and finally determine whether you should make that decision.

In Conclusion

Confusion is a normal state of life; the boat will naturally go straight when it reaches the bridge.

Recommendations:

Read less dry content, read more books.

Both ability and aesthetics are ultimately in your own control.

Stop saying you can solve problems through willpower.

Falling into self-doubt again? Here are some suggestions to help you feel capable again.

I recommend a few books that I think are great.

If you’re unhappy at work and want to quit but don’t know what you want to do next, what should you do?

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