As mentioned in the previous article, most areas of our society are "black swan" areas, and prediction is not feasible. People or organizations that believe in predictions will be "destroyed" by the ruthless black swan incident.
In this case, what can be done to eliminate this unpredictable black swan event? The answer is obviously impossible, just as we can't eliminate negative emotions. What we have to do is to tame these emotions, control them and turn negative emotions into effective information and practical actions for me. At this time, we are vulnerable. As the book says, "Modern Stoic practitioners are people who can turn fear into caution, pain into information, mistakes into consciousness and desires into career."
Then, how to judge whether you are in a state of anti-vulnerability, there is a judgment test: in fluctuations, gains outweigh losses, and favorable factors outweigh unfavorable factors. This is the favorable asymmetry, that is, anti-vulnerability.
As for how to deal with the unpredictable black swan incident, the book also gives the answer-"barbell strategy"
The premise of applying "barbell strategy" is to always remember this principle: the logic of survival takes precedence over everything. In other words, try to reduce the probability of contact with negative black swan events. Therefore, the first step to increase anti-vulnerability is actually to reduce unfavorable factors, not to increase favorable factors.
"Barbell strategy": refers to adopting a conservative strategy in some areas, taking the initiative in some areas, and taking greater risks and higher returns. Of course, survival is above everything else.
The "barbell strategy" is obviously different from those seemingly tempting medium-risk strategies, which seems to be able to obtain "benefits" more stably, but in fact, it is also fragile when it comes to negative black swan events. The "barbell strategy" circumvents this point well and can spare no effort to meet the positive black swan incident.
Here are two examples to deepen the understanding of barbell strategy:
1. Financial field: If you have a sum of money, you spend 90% of it on buying China government bonds (government bonds are considered as zero-risk investments), and the remaining 10% is invested in high-risk or extremely high-risk stocks, then your loss cannot exceed 10%, and there is no upper limit on your income. And if you put 65,438+0,000% of the funds into the so-called "medium" risk fund, you are likely to suffer devastating risks because of the closure of the fund.
2, career choice: first do safety work, when there is a certain savings, engage in random risks and high returns.
This book lists the career choices of a friend of the author. This friend once found himself a very stable job as a book editor, and he was also considered a very good editor. Then, after working for 10 years, he left his job to engage in a highly speculative and risky career. If his speculation fails, or he can't reach the expected satisfaction, he can completely return to his old job.
Therefore, the random barbell strategy will strengthen the anti-vulnerability by weakening the vulnerability and eliminating the adverse risks caused by injuries, that is, reducing the pain caused by adverse events and ensuring potential benefits.