I’m not good at math. I never was and probably never will be. Everything I know about math is how to deal with percentages and subtracting costs from revenues.
If you’d ask me stuff about calculus or how to calculate the volume of a hexagon I would probably not be able to give you an answer.
I might fire up Google to find an answer, in case I really want to know the answer.
But what I know for sure is that an equation with an unlimited amount of unknowns and only one known is unsolvable.
Or at least I wouldn’t be able to solve it.
Let’s take a quick look at an example so you can better understand what I mean. I wouldn’t be able to solve the equation below. Would you?
a + b + c +d +e +f +g +h + …n = xyz
We can call this thing the "life equation". An equation where we only know one thing, ourselves. Let's say we only know what "a" is.
So in this example here, it should stand for us as individuals, including our abilities, strengths, weaknesses and so on.
Hence, we are the only predictable thing in this equation.
If we go one step further, this equation that we see right there could pretty much describe our lives (at least from a non mathematician perspective like mine).
There is only one thing we know for sure. One thing that we can predict, more or less. And that is ourselves.
As soon as some other things or people come into play it’s almost impossible to predict results, outcomes or any future developments.
We might try to control or influence things and try to steer the results in the direction we want them to be heading to, but in the end we can’t accurately predict anything.
In the “life equation” everything is unpredictable and out of our control.
We might be able to make some sort of assumptions, but in the end the probability that we correctly forecasted all of them is zero.
We are not able to solve this equation (or at least I can’t).
Now here's the funny thing about the "life equation".
We foolishly base our lives on the fact that we are able to solve this unsolvable equation and predict all of its components in an absolutely adequate way.
We make plans about our future, about how we want to live our lives, about our careers, how things should develop and we plan for ourselves to settle down and start living the life we planned.
Then all of a sudden one of the unknown variables turns out to develop in a whole other direction than anticipated (this probability is quite high).
We might lose our job, the stock market might develop badly, our assets might lose a tremendous amount of value, we might get divorced or one of our close ones leaves us for good.
Our world is crushed. Our life plan is dead. Our solution of the equation turns out to be wrong.
This usually results in a lot of frustration, disappointment, passiveness, doubts, fear, anger and sometimes even depression.
But it could actually be so easy (from a math point of view at least).
Instead of trying to anticipate life’s unknown variables we should be more like kids, approach life more from the perspective of play and never stop learning lessons.
Lessons that might be very hard and leave a lot of scars behind. But at the end of the day these will be the lessons that will fill our life's story books.
Just like my legs full of scars that remind me of all my stupid and painful childhood stories.
Stories of my life...
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