Why Dummies Win in the Game of Life
One of my favorite movies of all time is the Academy Award-winning movie, Forrest Gump. The movie takes its name from its Lead character and portrayed by Tom Hanks. It tells the story of a simple-minded man, with a below-average IQ, who despite having no dreams or aspirations, goes on to achieve feats that people smarter than he was could only dream about. The reason he could was that he was oblivious to the limiting beliefs that held other people back. Forrest Gump is our prototypical Dummy.
For more than a decade, I have drawn lessons from observing trends that held lots of sensible people back. I have also, within this period, noticed supposedly ‘dumb’ people make incredible strides in various walks of life.
I have come to realize that there is a possibility that our ‘sensibility’ could be ruining our chances of attaining the heights we know we potentially can.
We may or may not know this, but most times, we stand in our way much more than anyone or anything else possibly could.
I’m certain you’ve come across people who are presumably less talented, less intelligent, or less ‘deserving’ than you accomplish stuff you which you could.
If you’re a ‘sensible’ person, then you know by now that there are things you can or cannot do. For instance, you cannot decide to start a business, you need to get an MBA to do that. You cannot wake up one morning and decide to write and publish, that’s for people called Writers. Likewise, you cannot decide to sing, you need to first learn the keys and how to hit the right notes. There are rules, written or unwritten that you must follow to the letter. Do you see the ridiculousness in the above?
Dummies permit themselves to do stuff that others wait for permission to. And for more than 2 decades of my life, I wrote, but I never published nor make a dime off writing. And to this day, I have a shelf full of unfinished drafts that haunt me.
Because I did not publish or put my writings out there, I missed out on the opportunity of getting feedback. Getting feedback would no doubt have been useful for my growth and improvement as a writer.
So, while we’re waiting for validation and permission to do the things we want to, ‘Dummies’ are out there getting stuff done. They simply choose themselves, explore their curiosities, and expand their perception of possibility.
Too many people out there shut down their bright ideas without giving them a good shot. This is in contrast with ‘Dummies’ who, even with ‘crappy’ ideas, would follow through on them until they get some valuable feedback. Based on that feedback, they come to decide what works and what doesn’t, iterate and keep moving.
Dummies are excited by opportunities and possibilities that most other people would normally take for granted. Jack ma, the Billionaire founder of Alibaba admits to knowing next to nothing about computers. His first encounter with the internet, led to the founding of Alibaba, even though he was just a school teacher with no money. He saw a possibility, and jumped on it. A similar analogy can be drawn for Sir Richard Branson and a lot of others. To quote the 19th-century American Essayist and Philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson “The invariable mark of wisdom is to see the miraculous in the common.”
A lot of people are intimidated by what already is. They feel little, overwhelmed, and insignificant in the light of the enormousness and complexity of everything around them -airplanes, skyscrapers, rockets, Movie stars, etc. But Dummies are rather fascinated and curious about things and often quite willing to try them or figure them out too.
The truth is, everything that is, comes from centuries of growth and iteration, and is built on the back of pre-existing things, concepts, knowledge, and possibilities. Impressive as his exploits are, Elon Musk did not think up Space, rockets, Space exploration all by himself. He gleaned off pre-existing knowledge, used pre-existing tools and concept, but was more importantly, ‘dumb’ enough to follow through, risking his reputation and finances in the process.
And to quote Steve Job “When you grow up you, tend to get told that the world is the way it is and your life is just to live your life inside the world. Try not to bash into the walls too much. Try to have a nice family life, have fun, save a little money. That’s a very limited life. Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact: Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use. To shake off this erroneous notion that life is just there, and you’re just gonna live in it, versus embrace it. Change it, improve it. Make your mark upon it. And once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.”
Dummies give themselves the permission and liberty to try things, to experiment, to push the envelope further, if for no other reason, for the experience.
Perhaps, the most defining difference between the Dummies and everyone else is that Dummies see themselves as a part of the universe. And as such are not terrified by it. But most other people walk on eggshells around it.
The bottom line is this, while some people make Fear-based decisions, others make Adventure-based decisions. The former are the ‘Sensible’ people, and the latter are Dummies. Sensible people tilt towards ‘safety’, while dummies tilt towards ‘adventure’, and this variance in their mental posturing makes all the difference.