Yes...................

 

History teaches you to avoid overconfidence.

-Ben Carlson

About those free lunches...........

 

Improved confidence in the future is a good thing in and of itself, since it surely promotes greater saving and investment, which ultimately translate into more and better-paying jobs and higher living standards. On the other hand, finding good values in a period of tranquility becomes harder, and the market becomes more susceptible to disappointments. There's no free lunch, but things could certainly be a lot worse than they are today.

-Scott Grannis, from this post

a "system of response".............

 

I rarely worry about taking care of myself in most situations.  This confidence is because I have a "system of response' to address external factors that my instructors have drilled so deeply into my muscle memory I don't have to think about what I'd do in a fight, as my body knows how to respond automatically.  That's the beauty of having a reliable system—it gets the indecisive, overthinking, pausing brain out of the way and lets the body's natural but practiced response mechanism react without the conscious mind slowing things down.

-Kevin Ervin Kelley, Irreplaceable

on winging it...................

 

You might believe you need more experience or qualifications in order to feel confident among your peers, but the truth is that even the most experienced and qualified people feel as though they're winging it much of the time—and that if you're ever going to make you unique contribution to the world, you'll probably have to do it in a state of feeling unprepared.

-Oliver Burkeman, Meditations for Mortals

On civilisation and belief.....

 Civilisation requires a modicum of material prosperity—enough to provide a little leisure.  But, far more, it requires confidence—confidence in the society in which one lives, belief in its philosophy, belief in its laws, and confidence in one's own mental powers. . . .Vigour, energy, vitality: all of the great civilisations—or civilising epochs—have had a weight of energy behind them.  People sometimes think that civilisation consists of fine sensibilities and good conversation and all that.  These can be among the agreeable results of civilization, but they are not what makes civilisation, and a society can have these amenities and yet be dead and rigid.

-Kenneth Clark, Civilisation

A bit of confidence.............

 I describe my forecasting model as “good enough.”

I’m confident people will solve problems and become more productive over time.

I’m confident markets will allocate the rewards of that productivity to investors over time.

I’m confident in other people’s overconfidence, so I know there will be mistakes and accidents and booms and busts along the way.

It’s not detailed, but it’s good enough.

-Morgan Housel, from here

Tethered.................................

Affection exchange theory, introduced by Professor Kory Floyd, postulates that affection strengthens bonds, provides access to resources, and communicates your potential as a parent, increasing your pool of potential mates.   I think it goes deeper.  I know a lot of people who, despite their good fortune, are wandering.  Few meaningful relationships, an inability to find reward in their professional lives, too hard on themselves, etc.  It's as if they're not grounded, never convinced of their worth . . . wandering.
     When I look at my own success, it mostly boils down to two things:  being born in America and having someone irrationally passionate about my well-being—my mom. . . .
      Having a good person express how wonderful you are hundreds of times changes everything.  College, professional success, an impressive mate—these were aspirations, not givens for a remarkably unremarkable kid in an upper-lower-middle-class household.  My mom was forty-three, single, and making $15,000 a year as a secretary.  She was also a good person who made me feel connected and, while waiting for our Opel, gave me the confidence that I had value, that I was capable and deserving of all these things.  Holding hands and laughing, I was tethered.

-Scott Galloway,  The Algebra of Happiness:  Notes on the Pursuit of Success, Love, and Meaning

Thing are definitely not equal.............

     We all spend a lot of time complaining about incompetence, but as Malcolm Gladwell pointed out in a talk he gave at High Point University, overconfidence is the far bigger problem.  Why?  Incompetence is a problem that inexperienced people have, and all things being equal, we don't entrust inexperience people with all that much power or authority.  Overconfidence is usually the mistake of experts, and we do give them a lot of power and authority.  Plain and simple, incompetence is frustrating, but the people guilty of it usually can't screw things up that bad.  The people guilty of overconfidence can do much more damage.

-Eric Barker,   Barking Up The Wrong Tree:  The Surprising Science Behind Why Everything You Know About Success Is (Mostly) Wrong

an invitation...........................

Declaring our uncertainty in our beliefs to others makes us more credible communicators.  We assume that if we don't come off as 100% confident, others will value our opinions less.  The opposite is usually true.  If one person expresses a belief as absolutely true, and someone else expresses a belief by saying, "I believe this is true, and I'm 80% on it,"  who are you more likely to believe?  The fact that the person is expressing their confidence as less than 100% signals that they are trying to get at the truth, that they have considered the quantity and quality of their information with thoughtfulness and self-awareness.  And thoughtful and self-aware people are more believable.
     Expressing our level of confidence also invites people to be our collaborators. ... By saying, "I'm 80%" and thereby communicating we aren't sure, we open the door for others to tell us what they know.  They realize they can contribute without having to confront us  by saying or implying , "You're wrong."  Admitting we are not sure is an invitation for help in refining our beliefs, and that will make our beliefs much more accurate over time as we are more likely to gather relevant information.

-Annie Duke,  Thinking In Bets:  Making Smarter Decisions When You Don't Have All The Facts

the common consequence................

"Confidence is the common consequence of success.  They whose excellence of any kind has been loudly celebrated, are ready to conclude that their powers are universal."

-Samuel Johnson,  Johnson on Shakespeare: essays and notes

Within.................................

"If you can, find that peace within yourself, that peace and quiet and confidence that you can pass on to others, so that they know you are honest and you are fair and you will help them, no matter what, when the chips are down."

-Dick Winters, from Band of Brothers fame

Self...................................

"... the only highly sustainable source of self-confidence comes from deep self-knowledge and blatant self-honesty."
-Chade-Meng Tan, Search Inside Yourself:  The Unexpected Path To Achieving Success, Happiness (And World Peace)

Fulfillment.......................................

Finding meaning and satisfaction at work.  The quest starts here.

"Not having a plan quickly puts us at the mercy of  those who do have one."

via

Believe...................................

"Somehow, I can't believe that there are any heights that can't be scaled by a man by a man who knows the secret of making dreams come true. The special secret it seems to me is summarized  in  four C's. 

They are Curiosity,Courage, Confidence and Constancy. And the greatest of all is Confidence. When you believe in a thing, believe in it all the way, implicitly and unquestionably."
-Walt Disney

Trying to remember the last time..................

............I felt confidence in the Federal Government.  I'm very confident that I felt confidence on July 21th, 1969 when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin launched their ascent module from the surface of the moon to rejoin the Apollo 11 command module for the trip back to earth.  I am highly confident I felt confidence on  August 9th, 1974 when Jerry Ford took his oath of office as President of the United States upon Richard Nixon's resignation.  I'm sort of confident that I felt confidence in the manner that George H. W. Bush and his administration organized and waged the first Gulf War early in 1991.  You might offer some helpful suggestions, but beyond those examples (and maybe a few more I've forgotten about), I don't find the behavior and activities of our Federal Government all that confidence inspiring.  Which is a shame.  This topic arose today because of this blog post from WRM.  Excerpts here:

"The federal government needs to rebuild public confidence in the concept of health care reform by way of discrete changes that make small but important improvements."

"The fantasy that there is one big, seamless reform that will make everything work beautifully leads a lot of people on unicorn hunts. Wonks of both sides might wish they could push through their pet reforms, convincing people to bear with lots of short-term disruption, but politics and public opinion just don’t allow that."

Wishing them luck.

Yep...................................

thanks Jess

Winning and Losing...........

"Never let the fear of striking out get in your way."
-Babe Ruth

On risk avoidance.............

Rising.......................

One World Trade Center under construction.   God love NYC!

One way to boost consumer confidence.....

Of course, by the time you read this, the price will probably
have been raised by thirty cents a gallon.  It's that old giveth
and taketh away thing they seem to do regularly.  Oh well, it
was fun today.