Adversity
is the crucible that tests your will. And the worst part is: you cannot
escape adversity, no matter how hard you try. Sooner or later, all of
us have to face difficult moments.
Your
budding business might fail, the book you’re working on might not
resonate with the audience, your marriage might fizzle off, or you might
be thrown out of that cushy, comfortable job you’re in right now.
You can’t change your destiny. But you can change the way you react to it.
Proper
training of the mind, body, and spirit can help you achieve resilience
and better equip you to confront life’s ups and downs.
Learning to Be Antifragile
I was going through a phase of significant change on the personal front when I came across this brilliant book Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. In it, the author discusses the concept of resilience as the ability to withstand difficulties without breaking.
The book introduces the term antifragile as
the ability of a person not just to resist shocks but to use them as a
launchpad to become a better, more robust version of themselves. You can become antifragile when you learn to turn a catastrophe into an opportunity for personal growth.
Taleb
discusses a three-step strategy to turn every misfortune into an
opportunity. His approach has helped me rethink some of my worst
personal failings and visualise them as chances to make myself better.
As the author quotes,
“Difficulty is what wakes up the genius.”
In
this article, I am going to share the critical facets of Taleb’s
formula on how I learned from them to be antifragile. You can apply them
in your life to not let setbacks deter you from pursuing your goals.
Step 1: Create Options
I
have always wanted to quit my job and pursue writing full-time. The
only problem stopping me was that even though I had published three
books, the income I made from the sales was not enough to sustain my
monthly expenses. I found this demotivating and always wondered: if the sales go on this way, how am I ever going to quit my job and focus my time and energy on writing?
That is when I read Taleb’s book and the key lesson of having multiple options resonated with me.
The power of creating options
According
to the author, it is best to not focus all your energy on one source of
income. Have a side hustle and try to create multiple channels of
revenue so that even if one of them fails by a stroke of bad luck, you
are not rendered destitute.
In
the same way, when it comes to the personal sphere, don’t make your
partner the centre of your life so that if the relationship does not
work, you don’t lose everything. Instead, cultivate meaningful
friendships and a life full of hobbies along the way, so you will be in a
better position to move on and rebuild your life after a falling out.
You might think that your job is secure, and starting a business will be a drain on time you are already short on.
Or that your relationship is rock-solid and it is meaningless to have any other friends when your partner is all you need.
This false sense of security might have lulled you into believing the comfortable status quo will last forever. As Taleb argues,
“Success brings an asymmetry: you now have a lot more to lose than to gain. You are hence fragile.”
It
is essential to understand life is unpredictable and unexpected things
that you wouldn’t have imagined in your wildest dreams can happen to
anyone. It is better to be prepared for them than to live in denial and
be taken by surprise when misfortune befalls.
How I applied this lesson
When
it came to my dream of becoming a full-time writer, I understood that
it would indeed be hard if I seek to make a living off my book sales
alone. If I intended to have a good life, I needed to have other sources
of income, and that is okay. I started exploring other options (Medium
is one of them!) and so far, things have worked out great.
If
all goes well and a couple of my options keep generating a steady
income as they are doing right now, I might be able to quit my job by
the end of this year!
Step 2: Take Calculated Risks
I
am not an expert in personal finance. But, I do understand that if I
plan to live my life doing something as volatile as writing, I need to
have a steady source of passive income. I consulted with a friend who
works in the investment banking sector, and she suggested that I invest
in mutual funds. The first few schemes I heard sounded so lucrative, my
first instinct was to splurge all my savings on them
What she told me next complements the second tenet of Taleb’s model.
Bet keeping the risks in mind
The
secret to becoming antifragile is to take small risks that might give
great returns without exposing yourself to dangers big enough to sink
you.
A perfect example to elucidate this concept can be given by considering the world of finance.
Let’s
say; you have $100,000 saved up that you plan to invest in stocks. You
invest $80,000 into a fixed-deposit, and the remaining $20,000 in ten
start-ups with potential for tremendous growth, say $2000 each.
A
possible scenario is that three of the companies you invested in fail
completely, and you lose $6000. The values of three other companies go
down, and you lose another $4000. The values of three others go up, and
you gain $2000, and the value of one company increases twenty-fold, i.e.
you make $40,000 or more.
Thus,
even though three of the businesses you invested in went utterly under
the water, you still made substantial gains. This is what is meant by
taking calculated risks.
In
other words, to become antifragile in the face of adversity, bet
cautiously in some areas and take several small risks in others that
would lead to a great reward. As Taleb writes,
“Not seeing a tsunami or an economic event coming is excusable; building something fragile to them is not.”
How I applied this lesson
I
took the author (and my friend’s) advice. I chose a few debt funds, a
few equity funds, and a couple of large-cap stocks. Yes, my money would
be locked away for a longer period of time, but at least, even if all
else failed, the investments would ensure I don’t lose money, no matter what.
Step 3: Quit Things That Make You Fragile
Since I post most of my writing on social media, I had the bad habit of scrolling through Instagram and Twitter for hours,
sometimes, even taking a break just to see how my posts were doing.
When I read this book, I realised that this habit wasn’t giving me any
returns and was taking a huge toll on my time and energy. In other
words, it was making me fragile.
Let some habits and people go
Ask
yourself this: what makes you fragile? Do you have certain people or
certain daily habits in your life that generate losses for you and make
you vulnerable? They might come disguised as well-wishers, but to be
genuinely antifragile, you need to learn to identify people and things
that cause you harm and get rid of them. In Taleb’s words,
“This
is the tragedy of modernity: as with neurotically overprotective
parents, those trying to help are often hurting us the most.”
Most
people today are experts at making to-do lists and lists of things or
habits they wish to acquire. It is equally important to make lists of
items, patterns, and people you need to get rid of. For example:
Don’t get into more debt before paying off all your old loans.
Quit wasting time and energy waiting for the call of the person you know deep down is not in the least bothered about you.
Avoid spending time with that toxic bunch of friends who always belittles your goals and calls your passion a “hobby”.
Stop spending time doing things you don’t enjoy, but keep doing because you feel obligated to do so.
How I applied this lesson
I
installed a screen-time analyser on my phone and made sure I spent less
than thirty minutes each day on Instagram. This way, I was saved from
the anxiety of constantly refreshing the page to check how many likes my
posts had received, and I had a lot of time on my hand to do the tasks I
enjoyed, namely, creating content.
Final Thoughts
I
am not a full-time author yet, but the concept of antifragility has
helped me make plans that might someday yield concrete results. Summing
up, the key lesson learned from the book can be put forward as-
To
cultivate the quality of not letting setbacks have a significant impact
on your life, you should not fear adversity because failures are
inevitable. Instead, you should focus on turning each setback into an opportunity and become truly antifragile.
If
you follow the three-step strategy suggested by Taleb, you can find a
way to get stronger with every misfortune that befalls you, and not let
it stray you from your path towards achieving your goal in life.
You
cannot run away from bad fortune. But you can build a steel-hard
attitude that will help you survive failure and set newer, better goals
with each blow life deals you.
Let me conclude this with a gem from Taleb:
“We
need randomness, mess, adventure, uncertainty, self-discovery, hear
traumatic episodes, all these things that make life worth living.”
Author,
Engineer, & Lover of fantasy fiction. I write about books, feminism
& personal development. Find out more at https://authoranangsha.com
| IG: anangsha_
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