Never Judge a Decision by Its Outcome

A quick hypothesis: Say one million monkeys speculate on the stock market. They buy and sell stocks like crazy and, of course, completely at random. What happens? After one week, about half of the monkeys will have made a profit and the other half a loss. The ones that made a profit can stay; the ones that made a loss you send home. In the second week, one half of the monkeys will still be riding high, while the other half will have made a loss and are sent home. And so on. After ten weeks, about one thousand monkeys will be left—those who have always invested their money well. After twenty weeks, just one monkey will remain—this one always, without fail, chose the right stocks and is now a billionaire. Let’s call him the success monkey.

How does the media react? It will pounce on this animal to understand its “success principles.” And they will find some: Perhaps the monkey eats more bananas than the others. Perhaps he sits in another corner of the cage. Or maybe he swings headlong through the branches, or he takes long, reflective pauses while grooming. He must have some recipe for success, right? How else could he perform so brilliantly? Spot-on for two years—and that from a simple monkey? Impossible!

The monkey story illustrates the outcome bias: We tend to evaluate decisions based on the result rather than on the decision process. This fallacy is also known as the “historian error.” A classic example is the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Should the military base have been evacuated or not? From today’s perspective: obviously, for there was plenty of evidence that an attack was imminent. However, only in retrospect do the signals appear so clear. At the time, in 1941, there was a plethora of contradictory signals. Some pointed to an attack; others did not. To assess the quality of the decision, we must use the information available at the time, filtering out everything we know about it postattack (particularly that it did indeed take place).

       Another experiment: You must evaluate the performance of three heart surgeons. To do this, you ask each to carry out a difficult operation five times. Over the years, the probability of dying from these procedures has stabilized at 20 percent. With surgeon A, no one dies. With surgeon B, one patient dies. With surgeon C, two die. How do you rate the performances of A, B, and C? If you think like most people, you rate A the best, B the second best, and C the worst. And thus you’ve just fallen for the outcome bias. You can guess why: The samples are too small, rendering the results meaningless. You can only really judge a surgeon if you know something about the field, and then carefully monitor the preparation and execution of the operation. In other words, you assess the process and not the result. Alternatively, you could employ a larger sample: one hundred or one thousand operations if you have enough patients who need this particular operation. For now it is enough to know that, with an average surgeon, there is a 33 percent chance that no one will die, a 41 percent chance that one person will die, and a 20 percent chance that two people will die. That’s a simple probability calculation. What stands out: There is no huge difference between zero dead and two dead. To assess the three surgeons purely on the basis of the outcomes would be not only negligent, but also unethical.

In conclusion: Never judge a decision purely by its result, especially when randomness and “external factors” play a role. A bad result does not automatically indicate a bad decision and vice versa. So rather than tearing your hair out about a wrong decision, or applauding yourself for one that may have only coincidentally led to success, remember why you chose what you did. Were your reasons rational and understandable? Then you would do well to stick with that method, even if you didn’t strike it lucky last time.

You Control Less Than You Think

Every day, shortly before nine o’clock, a man with a red hat stands in a square and begins to wave his cap around wildly. After five minutes, he disappears. One day, a policeman comes up to him and asks: “What are you doing?” “I’m keeping the giraffes away.” “But there aren’t any giraffes here.” “Well, I must be doing a good job, then.”

A friend with a broken leg was stuck in bed and asked me to pick up a lottery ticket for him. I went to the store, checked a few boxes, wrote his name on it, and paid. As I handed him the copy of the ticket, he balked: “Why did you fill it out? I wanted to do that. I’m never going to win anything with your numbers!” “Do you really think it affects the draw if you pick the numbers?” I inquired. He looked at me blankly.

In casinos, most people throw the dice as hard as they can if they need a high number and as gingerly as possible if they are hoping for a low number—which is as nonsensical as football fans thinking they can swing a game by gesticulating in front of the TV. Unfortunately they share this illusion with many people who also seek to influence the world by sending out the “right” thoughts (i.e., vibrations, positive energy, karma . . . ).

The illusion of control is the tendency to believe that we can influence something over which we have absolutely no sway. This was discovered in 1965 by two researchers, Jenkins and Ward. Their experiment was simple, consisting of just two switches and a light. The men were able to adjust when the switches connected to the light and when not. Even when the light flashed on and off at random, subjects were still convinced that they could influence it by flicking the switches.

Or consider this example: An American researcher has been investigating acoustic sensitivity to pain. For this, he placed people in sound booths and increased the volume until the subjects signaled him to stop. The two rooms, A and B, were identical, save one thing: Room B had a red panic button on the wall. The button was purely for show, but it gave participants the feeling that they were in control of the situation, leading them to withstand significantly more noise. If you have read Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Primo Levi, or Viktor Frankl, this finding will not surprise you: The idea that people can influence their destiny, even by a fraction, encouraged these prisoners not to give up hope.

Crossing the street in Los Angeles is a tricky business, but luckily, at the press of a button, we can stop traffic. Or can we? The button’s real purpose is to make us believe we have an influence on the traffic lights, and thus we’re better able to endure the wait for the signal to change with more patience. The same goes for “door-open” and “door-close” buttons in elevators: Many are not even connected to the electrical panel. Such tricks are also designed in open-plan offices: For some people it will always be too hot, for others, too cold. Clever technicians create the illusion of control by installing fake temperature dials. This reduces energy bills—and complaints. Such ploys are called “placebo buttons” and they are being pushed in all sorts of realms.

Central bankers and government officials employ placebo buttons masterfully. Take, for instance, the federal funds rate, which is an extreme short-term rate—an overnight rate, to be precise. While this rate doesn’t affect long-term interest rates (which are a function of supply and demand, and which are an important factor in investment decisions), the stock market, nevertheless, reacts frenetically to its every change. Nobody understands why overnight interest rates can have such an effect on the market, but everybody thinks they do, and so they do. The same goes for pronouncements made by the chairman of the Federal Reserve; markets move, even though these statements inject little of tangible value into the real economy. They are merely sound waves. And still we allow economic heads to continue to play with the illusory dials. It would be a real wake-up call if all involved realized the truth—that the world economy is a fundamentally uncontrollable system.

And you? Do you have everything under control? Probably less than you think. Do not think you command your way through life like a Roman emperor. Rather, you are the man with the red hat. Therefore, focus on the few things of importance that you can really influence. For everything else: Que sera, sera. 

Why “No Pain, No Gain” Should Set Alarm Bells Ringing

A few years ago, I was on vacation in Corsica and fell sick. The symptoms were new to me, and the pain was growing by the day. Eventually I decided to seek help at a local clinic. A young doctor began to inspect me, prodding my stomach, gripping my shoulders and knees, and then poking each vertebra. I began to suspect that he had no idea what my problem was, but I wasn’t really sure so I simply endured the strange examination. To signal its end, he pulled out his notebook and said: “Antibiotics. Take one tablet three times a day. It’ll get worse before it gets better.” Glad that I now had a treatment, I dragged myself back to my hotel room with the prescription in hand.

The pain grew worse and worse—just as the doctor had predicted. The doctor must have known what was wrong with me after all. But, when the pain hadn’t subsided after three days, I called him. “Increase the dose to five times a day. It’s going to hurt for a while more,” he said. After two more days of agony, I finally called the international air ambulance. The Swiss doctor diagnosed appendicitis and operated on me immediately. “Why did you wait so long?” he asked me after the surgery.

I replied: “It all happened exactly as the doctor said, so I trusted him.”

“Ah, you fell victim to the it’ll-get-worse-before-it-gets-better fallacy. That Corsican doctor had no idea. Probably just the same type of stand-in you find in all the tourist places in high season.”

Let’s take another example: A CEO is at his wit’s end: Sales are in the toilet, the salespeople are unmotivated, and the marketing campaign sank without a trace. In his desperation, he hires a consultant. For $5,000 a day, this man analyzes the company and comes back with his findings: “Your sales department has no vision, and your brand isn’t positioned clearly. It’s a tricky situation. I can fix it for you—but not overnight. The measures will require sensitivity, and, most likely, sales will fall further before things improve.” The CEO hires the consultant. A year later, sales fall, and the same thing happens the next year. Again and again, the consultant stresses that the company’s progress corresponds closely to his prediction. As sales continue their slump in the third year, the CEO fires the consultant.

A mere smoke screen, the it’ll-get-worse-before-it-gets-better fallacy is a variant of the so-called confirmation bias. If the problem continues to worsen, the prediction is confirmed. If the situation improves unexpectedly, the customer is happy, and the expert can attribute it to his prowess. Either way he wins.

Suppose you are president of a country and have no idea how to run it. What do you do? You predict “difficult years” ahead, ask your citizens to “tighten their belts,” and then promise to improve the situation only after this “delicate stage” of “cleansing,” “purification,” and “restructuring.” Naturally you leave the duration and severity of the period open.

           The best evidence of this strategy’s success is the religious zealot who believes that before we can experience heaven on earth, the world must be destroyed. Disasters, floods, fires, death—they are all part of the larger plan and must take place. These believers will view any deterioration of the situation as confirmation of the prophecy and any improvement as a gift from God.

In conclusion: If someone says, “It’ll get worse before it gets better,” you should hear alarm bells ringing. But beware: Situations do exist where things first dip, then improve. For example, a career change requires time and often incorporates loss of pay. The reorganization of a business also takes time. But in all these cases, we can see relatively quickly if the measures are working. The milestones are clear and verifiable. Look to these rather than to the heavens. 

Why You Should Forget the Past

The film was dire. After an hour, I whispered to my wife: “Come on, let’s go home.” She replied: “No way. We’re not throwing away thirty dollars.” “That’s no reason to stay,” I protested. “The money’s already gone. This is the sunk cost fallacy at work—a thinking error!” She glared at me as if she had just bitten off a piece of lemon. Okay, I sometimes go overboard on the subject, itself an error called déformation professionnelle I desperately tried to clarify the situation. “We have spent the thirty dollars regardless of whether we stay or leave, so this factor should not play a role in our decision.” Needless to say, I gave in and sunk back down in my seat.

The next day, I sat in a marketing meeting. Our advertising campaign had been running for four months and had not met even one of its goals. I was in favor of scrapping it. The advertising manager resisted, saying: “But we’ve invested so much money in it. If we stop now, it’ll all have been for nothing.” Another victim of the sunk cost fallacy.

A friend struggled for years in a troubled relationship. His girlfriend cheated on him time and again. Each time, she came back repentant and begged for forgiveness. He explained it to me this way: “I’ve invested so much energy in the relationship, it would be wrong to throw it away.” A classic case of the sunk cost fallacy.

The sunk cost fallacy is most dangerous when we have invested a lot of time, money, energy, or love in something. This investment becomes a reason to carry on, even if we are dealing with a lost cause. The more we invest, the greater the sunk costs are, and the greater the urge to continue becomes.

Investors frequently fall victim to the sunk cost fallacy. Often they base their trading decisions on acquisition prices. “I lost so much money with this stock, I can’t sell it now,” they say. This is irrational. The acquisition price should play no role. What counts is the stock’s future performance (and the future performance of alternative investments). Ironically, the more money a share loses, the more investors tend to stick by it.

This irrational behavior is driven by a need for consistency. After all, consistency signifies credibility. We find contradictions abominable. If we decide to cancel a project halfway through, we create a contradiction: We admit that we once thought differently. Carrying on with a meaningless project delays this painful realization and keeps up appearances.

The Concorde is a prime example of a government deficit project. Even though both parties, Britain and France, had long realized that the supersonic aircraft business would never work, they continued to invest enormous sums of money in it—if only to save face. Abandoning the project would have been tantamount to admitting defeat. The sunk cost fallacy is therefore often referred to as the “Concorde effect.” It leads to costly, even disastrous, errors of judgment. The Americans extended their involvement in the Vietnam War because of this. Their thinking: “We’ve already sacrificed so much for this war; it’d be a mistake to give up now.”

“We’ve come this far . . .” “I’ve read so much of this book already . . .” “But I’ve spent two years doing this course . . .” If you recognize any of these thought patterns, it shows that the sunk cost fallacy is at work in a corner of your brain.

Of course, there may be good reasons to continue investing in something to finalize it. But beware of doing so for the wrong reasons, such as to justify non-recoverable investments. Rational decision making requires you to forget about the costs incurred to date. No matter how much you have already invested, only your assessment of the future costs and benefits counts. 

If Fifty Million People Say Something Foolish, It Is Still Foolish

You are on your way to a concert. At an intersection, you encounter a group of people, all staring at the sky. Without even thinking about it, you peer upward, too. Why? Social proof. In the middle of the concert, when the soloist is displaying absolute mastery, someone begins to clap and suddenly the whole room joins in. You do, too. Why? Social proof. After the concert you go to the coat check to pick up your coat. You watch how the people in front of you place a coin on a plate, even though, officially, the service is included in the ticket price. What do you do? You probably leave a tip as well.

Social proof, sometimes roughly termed the “herd instinct,” dictates that individuals feel they are behaving correctly when they act the same as other people. In other words, the more people who follow a certain idea, the better (truer) we deem the idea to be. And the more people who display a certain behavior, the more appropriate, this behavior is judged by others. This is, of course, absurd.

Social proof is the evil behind bubbles and stock market panic. It exists in fashion, management techniques, hobbies, religion, and diets. It can paralyze whole cultures, such as when sects commit collective suicide.

A simple experiment, carried out in the 1950s by legendary psychologist Solomon Asch, shows how peer pressure can warp common sense. A subject is shown a line drawn on paper, and next to it three lines—numbered 1, 2, and 3—one shorter, one longer, and one the same length as the original one. He or she must indicate which of the three lines corresponds to the original one. If the person is alone in the room, he gives correct answers because the task is really quite simple. Now five other people enter the room; they are all actors, which the subject does not know. One after another, they give wrong answers, saying “number 1,” although it’s very clear that number 3 is the correct answer. Then it is the subject’s turn again. In one-third of cases, he will answer incorrectly to match the other people’s responses.

Why do we act like this? Well, in the past, following others was a good survival strategy. Suppose that fifty thousand years ago you were traveling around the Serengeti with your hunter-gatherer friends, and suddenly they all bolted. What would you have done? Would you have stayed put, scratching your head, and weighing up whether what you were looking at was a lion or something that just looked like a lion but was in fact a harmless animal that could serve as a great protein source? No, you would have sprinted after your friends. Later on, when you were safe, you could have reflected on what had actually happened. Those who acted differently—and I am sure there were some—exited the gene pool. We are the direct heirs of those who copied the others’ behavior. This pattern is so deeply rooted in us that we still use it today, even when it offers no survival advantage. Only a few cases come to mind where social proof is of value. For example, if you find yourself hungry in a foreign city and don’t know a good restaurant, it makes sense to pick the one that’s full of locals. In other words, you copy the locals’ behavior.

Comedy and talk shows make use of social proof by inserting canned laughter at strategic spots, inciting the audience to laugh along. One of the most impressive, though troubling, cases of this phenomenon is the famous speech by Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, delivered to a large audience in 1943. (See it for yourself on YouTube.) As the war went from bad to worse for Germany, he demanded to know: “Do you want total war? If necessary, do you want a war more total and radical than anything that we can even imagine today?” The crowd roared. If the attendees had been asked individually and anonymously, it is likely that nobody would have consented to this crazy proposal.

The advertising industry benefits greatly from our weakness for social proof. This works well when a situation is unclear (such as deciding among various car makes, cleaning products, beauty products, and so on, with no obvious advantages or disadvantages), and where people “like you and me” appear.

So be skeptical whenever a company claims its product is better because it is “the most popular.” How is a product better simply because it sells the most units? And remember English novelist W. Somerset Maugham’s wise words: “If fifty million people say something foolish, it is still foolish.” 

Does Harvard Make You Smarter?

As essayist and trader Nassim Taleb resolved to do something about the stubborn extra pounds he’d been carrying, he contemplated taking up various sports. However, joggers seemed scrawny and unhappy, and bodybuilders looked broad and stupid, and tennis players? Oh, so upper-middle-class! Swimmers, though, appealed to him with their well-built, streamlined bodies. He decided to sign up at his local swimming pool and to train hard twice a week.

A short while later, he realized that he had succumbed to an illusion. Professional swimmers don’t have perfect bodies because they train extensively. Rather, they are good swimmers because of their physiques. How their bodies are designed is a factor for selection and not the result of their activities. Similarly, female models advertise cosmetics and, thus, many female consumers believe that these products make you beautiful. But it is not the cosmetics that make these women model-like. Quite simply, the models are born attractive, and only for this reason are they candidates for cosmetics advertising. As with the swimmers’ bodies, beauty is a factor for selection and not the result.

Whenever we confuse selection factors with results, we fall prey to what Taleb calls the swimmer’s body illusion. Without this illusion, half of advertising campaigns would not work. But this bias has to do with more than just the pursuit of chiseled cheekbones and chests. For example, Harvard has the reputation of being a top university. Many highly successful people have studied there. Does this mean that Harvard is a good school? We don’t know. Perhaps the school is terrible, and it simply recruits the brightest students around. I experienced this phenomenon at the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland. It is said to be one of the top ten business schools in Europe, but the lessons I received (albeit twenty-five years ago) were mediocre. Nevertheless, many of its graduates were successful. The reason behind this is unknown—perhaps it was due to the climate in the narrow valley or even the cafeteria food. Most probable, however, is the rigorous selection.

All over the world, MBA schools lure candidates with statistics regarding future income. This simple calculation is supposed to show that the horrendously high tuition fees pay for themselves over a short period of time. Many prospective students fall for this approach. I am not implying that the schools doctor the statistics, but still their statements must not be swallowed wholesale. Why? Because those who pursue an MBA are different from those who do not. The income gap between both groups stems from a multitude of reasons that have nothing to do with the MBA degree itself. Once again we see the swimmer’s body illusion at work: the factor for selection confused with the result. So, if you are considering further study, do it for reasons other than a bigger paycheck.

When I ask happy people about the secret of their contentment, I often hear answers like “You have to see the glass half full rather than half empty.” It is as if these individuals do not realize that they were born happy and now tend to see the positive in everything. They do not realize that cheerfulness—according to many studies, such as those conducted by Harvard’s Dan Gilbert—is largely a personality trait that remains constant throughout life. Or, as social scientists David Lykken and Auke Tellegen starkly suggest, “trying to be happier is as futile as trying to be taller.” Thus, the swimmer’s body illusion is also a self-illusion. When these optimists write self-help books, the illusion can become treacherous. That’s why it’s important to give wide berth to tips and advice from self-help authors. For billions of people, these pieces of advice are unlikely to help. But because the unhappy don’t write self-help books about their failures, this fact remains hidden.

In conclusion: Be wary when you are encouraged to strive for certain things—be it abs of steel, immaculate looks, a higher income, a long life, a particular demeanor, or happiness. You might fall prey to the swimmer’s body illusion. Before you decide to take the plunge, look in the mirror—and be honest about what you see. 

What To Blog About - Finding A Blog Niche

One of the most common challenge that many bloggers face today is what to blog about. So if you are one of those who are struggling to find the right niche to blog about, keep reading.

Finding the right niche or topic for a blog always seems to be the first hurdle that many people struggle to decide when they create a blog. But it is an important process because you need to be able to visualize ahead of time where your blog is going in the future. You need to see the bigger picture so that you can slowly put the pieces together, one blog post at a time. By doing this, you are building a strong foundation for your niche-specific blog.

By having a clear vision of what your blog is all about and how you see your blog in the future, you can then start mapping out your plans early and act on those plans diligently in order to progress towards those goals and reach the level of success that you envisioned for your blog.

Part of mapping out your blog plans is coming up with blog post ideas. Blog post ideas are dependent on your blog niche. Therefore, the sooner you can figure out your blog niche, the faster you can start planning you blog posts, and build your blog, one post at a time.

Finding Your Niche. To make the process simpler for you when finding the right niche, think of the things that you are passionate about, the things that you love to do on a regular basis.

I strongly suggest that you don't just jump into a niche that you know nothing about or you are not into it, simply because you observe that many bloggers are doing it.

For example, there are many bloggers that are blogging about beauty and makeup (as an example for the ladies). But if you wear makeup once in a blue moon then it might not be such a good idea to write about makeup since you have limited knowledge or hardly no experience about the subject.

It is harder to preach something when you do not live the lifestyle nor do not do what you preach. I mean, you can, but it will take you a lot more time, energy and effort to write those type of blog posts because you also have to do additional research and figure out the niche itself, aside from constructing a blog post.

A great way to start in finding the right niche for yourself is to ask yourself some of these simple questions:

What are the things that you love to do?

What are your hobbies?

What are your interests?

What keeps you motivated and going on a regular basis?

It can be anything, really. Pets? Health? Exercise? Music? Playing instruments? Technology? Real estate? Business? Design? Arts? Crafts? Giving advice or helping others?

One great thing about blogging is that you have the option to choose whatever topic works best for you that you are comfortable writing about.

The best part about blogging is that you are pretty much your own boss, you run the show and you have the control and the power to choose what you want to write about, it's entirely up to you, except for the illegal and prohibited topics like pornography, hate crime, etc.

Why Finding The Right Niche For You Is Important. A blog is your center stage, with potentially the world as your readers or audience. So your creativity and imagination will play an important role in how well you present your blog, one blog post at a time.

Whatever topic you blog about, people who are passionate about the same topic, or are going through the same thing you go through, basing on the stories and experiences that you share on your blog, they will be able to relate to you more on a personal level and they are more likely inclined to follow you. You will develop a following if you put up enough valuable contents that your audience can relate to.

One of the main reason why it is so important that you have to consider the things that interests you and what you are truly passionate about is because it will give you the ability to produce better and more believable contents on a regular basis long term because you love doing it, you enjoy doing it. Your readers will be able to tell when you are passionate about your blog. Having the drive and motivation coming from within you, being passionate and loving what you are doing will show in your work and your readers and audience will be able to sense that.

When you choose to write about a niche that you actually love or you are passionate about then it will come out naturally from you and the process will be a lot smoother and enjoyable.

If you are enjoying what you are doing, then being able to  maintain your blog and consistently put out good contents for your readers will become second nature to you, instead of having a heavy weight that you have to carry all the time if you don't enjoy the process.

A common reason why there are blogs that die down after months or just few years of having them is because the bloggers themselves lack the motivation and the drive to write anymore blog posts because the topic doesn't excite them anymore or they ran out of ideas about the topic because they have limited knowledge or expertise on the subject.

That's why finding the right niche for your blog is so much more than what is popular, what is trending, or what everyone else is doing. It is more about you, evaluating yourself, the things you love to do or what you are passionate about.

Stay Focus On A Specific Niche. By all means, try to stay away from a general topic blog. Meaning, try to stay away from having a blog with no clear concise topic. With a general blog, a blogger usually just blog about whatever topic comes to mind.

It's been proven time and time again that most people cannot please everybody. If you try to cater to everybody, there is a good chance that you ended up catering to nobody.

Come to think of it, if one day you are writing about makeup and beauty products, and then the next blog post is about crafting, then another post is about animals. There is obviously no clear, concise blog topic going on and this can be very confusing, scattered and all over the place, don't you think so too?

How do you think your audience would feel?

By doing this, there is a huge tendency that you are going to lose valuable loyal readers and followers and some may even un-follow or unsubscribe if they feel lost and confuse about what your blog is really about. Granted, you may be interested in makeup, crafting, and animals, but your readers may not be all interested in the same topics combined as you are.

If you can find the right balance between what you love and what your readers love, then that would be the ideal case. You need to find that common ground in your blog that you and your readers can virtually meet and be able to enjoy each other's presence discussing a specific topic that you all are passionate about and/or can relate to.

The more niche specific your blog is, the better chances you have of attracting highly targeted readers that are truly interested in most if not all of the blog posts that you will publish.

It is worth noting that having a specific-niche blog will attract specific readers that are most interested in your specific niche, therefore, your readers will ended up being a highly targeted audience, which means that majority of them will most likely re-visit your blog and read your future blog entries because they know exactly the type of contents you share, so the possibility that these readers will stick around, remain as followers, and looking forward to your upcoming blog posts are higher. 

Blog Maintenance Overview - Do You Have What It Takes?

Let me ask you this, before you jump into a swimming pool, wouldn't you prefer to know the temperature of the water first? You will never know the temperature of the water just by looking at the inviting sparkly crystal blue water.

Same goes with blogging! It is definitely wise to know in advance what it takes to maintain a blog. Are you really up for it? Are you really willing to do this? These are things you need to assess beforehand, before you spend anymore of your precious time because as you go deeper and deeper into blogging, it's only going to take more and more of your time and suck in a lot of your ideas.

If you are planning to operate a blog, you need to assess yourself, preferably in the beginning of the process, to know if you have what it takes to do this long term. Since there are so many moving pieces when it comes to blogging successfully and have your blog thrive for a long time. It is important to know what it takes to keep your blog going so that you will be able to sustain it for several years since blogging is a long term commitment. If you have the desire to blog, I don't think your vision is only to do it for few years and then abandon it, right? I'm sure you envisioned your blog to last for a long time.

Granted, blogging will take a lot of your time, you might as well know beforehand what it takes to maintain a blog and see what you are up against to see if this is truly something that you want to do. Once you have some bird's eye view and have some ideas on the tasks ahead and what needs to be done, then you can better prepare yourself, be better equipped, get ready and move forward with blogging.

One major challenge of blogging is being able to produce contents in a consistent basis. The way in which a blog is presented online, which is in chronological order, it is so easy to determine when a blog is updated regularly or not. The way blog works is that the latest blog post, by default, is usually displayed on the first or top page of the blog. So when someone visits your blog, the blog visitor can easily tell when the blog was last updated, basing on the date of the last post which is usually the first post the visitor will see when he/she arrives in your blog.

Although it is highly advisable that you post in a consistent manner, there is no fix rule as to how frequent you should update a blog in order for it to be considered regularly updated.

Originally, many bloggers blog on a daily basis. Daily blogging might be easier to pull off when you are blogging about personal experiences since most people don't run out of day to day activities so there is always opportunities to blog about. There is always something going on in people's lives, doing this, doing that. All of these stuff they do are all potential blog posts.

However, if you are blogging about a specific niche or topic, it is a completely different story. Sometimes, you might need to do additional research in order to provide accurate, valuable and informative information about the topic. Writing a blog post on a daily basis can become overwhelming overtime and can cause burn outs, and burn outs can cause lack of enthusiasm and motivation.

By choosing to blog every day, you will soon realize that you are running out of ideas to blog about.

Just remember that there are 30 days in a month, that means 30 blog post ideas that you have to come up with in order to blog on a daily basis. Do you have 30 blog post ideas right now? If so, then great! You have one month worth of blog posts!

Many bloggers nowadays prefer to update their blogs on a weekly basis, as this blogging frequency seems to be so much more manageable compare to daily postings.

You can, however, post daily if you have the capability and the drive to do so. As mentioned earlier, there is no fix rule how frequent you should post. It is your decision to make.

You may be up for the challenge of daily blogging but then you have to also consider your readers. How often do your readers really want to read your blog? Do you think that by posting daily it will encourage your readers and followers to check your blog constantly, as constant as every single day? Or it will become overwhelming for them and therefore could benefit more from a weekly blog updates instead of daily updates.

It is also good to take into consideration that most people are busy with their own lives, therefore they might not have as frequent as everyday to spend reading your blog diligently. But then again, everybody is different, so you have to consider that although some readers may have time to read daily, some may not. The answers to these vague unknowns also depends on your target demographic.

Ultimately, it's all up to you to decide if you should do daily blogging or not.

Because of the nature of how a blog works, as mentioned earlier, which is usually arranged in chronological order, it naturally demands consistent updating, not necessary required, but doing so is a huge contributing factor for the overall success of your blog in the long run.

Consistent blogging does not mean daily blogging, it can be blogging at certain day of the week and keeping at it every single week.

To be a consistent blogger, it will demand a lot of your time and energy, and most importantly a lot of your creative ideas on what to blog about, that's why it is important that you are highly passionate about what you blog about (will be discuss further in the next chapter) because you have to constantly come up of ideas related to your blog on a regular manner for as long as you keep your blog alive and going.

When you are highly passionate about your blog niche, you have much better chance of coming up of plenty of blog post ideas and not ran out of it pretty quickly. You will need at least one blog post either weekly, bi-weekly, or whenever, depending on the frequency of posting that you decided on.

Can you imagine if you do decide to blog daily? How long do you think you can sustain your blog with all your existing blog post ideas if you decide to post on a daily basis?

Let's say you have thirty (30) different ideas of blog posts for your blog. And let's say that you decide to blog every day, what will happen the next month? Can you come up with the next thirty new ideas to write about related to your blog? What about the month after that? And so on and so forth.

This is why it is important that you determine your posting frequency ahead of time because you can visualize how much inventories of ideas you have available, and how fast they will ran out because your supply of ideas will go down either slow or fast depending on the frequency of your posting.

It is also important to point out that being able to produce blog contents on a consistent basis encourage your readers and followers to check out your blog regularly because you are giving them that impression that you do update your blog regularly and they can rely on the fact  that when they do re-visit your blog that they can expect to see a new blog post.

Even though you don't announce your regular posting schedules, your regular readers can judge the timing of your postings by seeing the date intervals in between your posts. If you follow certain posting schedule, then your regular readers might start to notice certain patterns or sequence in your postings, for instance, you usually post unannounced every weekend, or every Tuesday, etc.

In cases that you are unable to update your blog consistently as you would like, there can be not-so-desirable effects and consequences that can occur.  Imagine one of your blog follower visiting your blog one day and noticed that your last post was from three months ago. She might give you a benefit of a doubt and visit your blog again the following month, and if she sees the same old blog post that she saw the last time she visited, then that could cause some uncertainties in her mind, and she might make that dreaded conclusion that your blog is not updated regularly, or worse, that you are neglecting your own blog. With the conclusion that your blog visitor draw on her own, she might decide that from then on she will no longer visit your blog. Multiply that head count to all your regular readers. That can be a devastating loss of followers that you worked so hard to acquire from the start.

With that said, blog needs consistent updating, but to do so, it is so much easier said than done. I have to admit, as a blogger myself, it is not easy to come up with new blog posts regularly. I personally ran out of blog ideas on several occasions so I also face so much challenges trying to keep my blogs up-to-date on a regular basis.

As mentioned earlier, there is no fix rule as to the frequency of your blog posts, you can choose to update it daily, weekly, bi-monthly, or monthly, etc. But whatever posting frequency you decided on, it is highly advisable that you stick with that frequency in order to develop regular readers and followers in your blog, and they will feel that they can rely on your posting sequence and be confident that when they expect to see a blog post in that day of the week, they will. It may sound harsh and demanding, but this is one way to keep your audience reading and engaging with your content on a regular basis.

In order to develop regular audience or readers in your blog, you need to provide valuable up-to-date blog posts on a consistent basis for as long as your blog exist. That could mean several years, or perhaps a lifetime? Yes, it sound like work, but that is the type of commitment that you have to realize early on before you even make a decision to start a blog or not.

Whether you like it or not, a blog will certainly demand this type of maintenance for as long as you are blogging. The question is, are you up for it?

Healing Myself of Blindness

I was born in the Stalinist Soviet Union under difficult circumstances. My father was involved in an illegal business, taking and printing photographs for churches. This work could have resulted in his being sent to Siberia for twenty years. Furthermore, both my parents were deaf.

My grandparents on my father’s side were opposed to another child coming into the family. At first, it was my paternal grandfather who had noticed that something was wrong with my eyes. After an examination by doctors, it was revealed that I had been born with cataracts. And although many people develop cataracts later in life, very few are born with them. I was, for all practical purposes, born blind.

In search of a better life for all of us, my family decided to flee the Soviet Union and to relocate to the new country of Israel. During this time of transition for my family, five surgeries were performed on my eyes. The first, done in Poland on our way to Western Europe, was unsuccessful. The other four surgeries—all performed in Israel—had scarred my lenses to the point that 99 percent of them was scar tissue, effectively preventing light from getting through. As a result, I was issued a blind certificate by the state of Israel, and most people in my life had resigned themselves to the idea that I would never be able to see.

I was raised reading Braille, although I attended a standard school with normal-sighted children. I experienced much loneliness and isolation because of this situation. What do you do when you are blind, surrounded by normal-sighted people, and your parents communicate mostly with sign language that you cannot see? 

                 My father, who was very interested in current events, often wanted me to listen to the radio and to explain to him what was happening around the world. He would have me listen to the news and repeat it to him, which confused me at first. I didn’t understand why he had always lifted my head up when I tried to tell him what I had heard. I later realized it was because he had wanted to read my lips. But how would I know that reading lips was so important when I couldn’t even see lips moving? This tragic comedy more or less captures the early days of my life. I was surrounded by confusion, frustration, and struggle. But I was also learning that there are many ways to overcome the challenges people face due to the circumstances of their lives.

It was obvious to me that my parents loved me. Still, our life was marked by fear and insecurity, having escaped the repressions of the Soviet Union, only to move to the young state of Israel, which was ravaged with war. Because of their deafness, my parents could not study Hebrew, which was so different from the Russian they had spoken before. Additionally, my maternal grandparents lost all the money they had brought with them from the Soviet Union on bad investments in Israel. Yet through it all, my grandmother steadfastly believed in me and was able to find ways to help me. She stayed with me in hospital beds after surgeries, when I was traumatized and feeling insecure from hearing many other kids crying.

Other members of my family believed that I should depend on social services. Although I didn’t mind asking for money from my family, somehow I did not want to take it from the government. It was a deep instinct, the origin of which I understood later on as I matured. It is easy for a person who receives help from the government, as many with disabilities do, to develop a poor self-image as being needy or pitiful; it comes automatically, like it or not. But when you do not rely on that help, the image you have of yourself becomes stronger, and you are forced to become self-sufficient.

I was determined not to have the stigma of being a blind person. That basic resolve was the beginning of my transition and change, without which I would not have gotten to where I am today. As a response to the lack of security and uncertainty that filled my early life, I developed a sense of commitment. Kids often did not want to play with me. Girls would not dance with me at parties. I sometimes became lonely. But I understood the choice was with me to be depressed or to be happy.

So I escaped into my Braille books. With my books, I was in a different world and would read for hours on end. Even when my mother said, “Time to sleep, lights out,” I would just hide the books under my bed. Although our walls were thin, as soon as the lights were out and I knew that she couldn’t see me anymore, I pulled out my books again and kept reading.

Whenever more of my Braille books arrived at the post office, I would hurry to pick them up. The books were huge. I was something to marvel at, a small kid carrying a very large school bag on my back, tied and strapped to my shoulders, with a Braille typewriter squeezed under one arm and a sack of Braille books under the other. More than once, the typewriter fell and broke, and we would need to pay to get it repaired. My father always resented the price, and I felt guilty about having let the typewriter fall.

Slowly but surely, my muscles built up. Many a passerby felt I was engaged in too much lifting and carrying. But that lifting, in many ways, formed my character. I imagined that, one day, something would liberate me from my blindness, and I acted by it. 

I went from doctor to doctor, on my own.

I struggled against the resentment of the other children in school who thought I was receiving too much special treatment. They resented the fact that they had to explain to me what was on the blackboard. And I agreed with them! I wanted to be able to see the blackboard with my own eyes. I wanted to work on my own. I even had teachers that were mean to me because they felt I was not behaving right. They believed a blind kid was supposed to be submissive and passive—something I never was and, most likely, never would be.

I desperately wanted to be liberated from my condition. But all the doctors told me there was nothing I could do, that legal blindness was going to be my life, and that my vision would never be more than half of 1 percent without glasses, nor more than 4 or 5 percent with glasses. They said that I should accept the sight I had and that I should be happy with it. Those were nice words, but they did not work for me.

Discovering the Bates Method

My father was openly upset at the fact that his deafness prevented him from succeeding in life. My mother also felt like she was put down by the hearing world. I understood the prejudice they had experienced but, nonetheless, felt I had a bright future, though I did not know what it was.

Then one day I met another young boy named Jacob, who had dropped out of high school. He showed me eye exercises based on something called the Bates Method. I learned the eye exercises and started to work with them diligently.

To my amazement, as I practiced the Bates Method and experienced improvement, I received more complaints than ever from the authority figures in my life. You see, a part of my practice was to look from detail to detail; the purpose of this exercise was to stop my brain from being lazy. But my geography teacher would get upset as I moved my eyes from each bell beside the chalkboard to the other, looking at the details during class. She went all the way to the vice principal. Thankfully, the vice principal heard my case and told her that the exercises may help me, and that they did not disturb my ability to listen to her lessons.

My Bible studies teacher was upset that when my class sat in the yard reading biblical verses, I would close my eyes and face the sun, moving my head from side to side. When I faced the sun, my pupils would contract; when I moved my head to the side, my pupils would expand. My teacher said that it bothered him to see me moving my head from side to side, even though he recognized that I understood everything he was saying. He said that even though I was the best student in the class, I should stop doing the sunning because it bothered him.

Despite these reactions, I persisted. My retina started to wake up to light, and that was my vehicle to removing the thick, heavy, dark glasses that had made the world dimmer for me.

My mother was upset with the fact that I would run, ten times a day, up to the roof to do sunning. She said, “You are taking time out from your homework.” Then she was upset that I would for sit three hours a day and do palming, an exercise to rest my eyes and stop them from moving involuntarily.

There is no doubt in my mind that, whether you are in your twenties, thirties, forties, fifties, sixties, seventies, or beyond, you can change the function of your eyes. There is enough elasticity in your brain to back it up. The problem isn’t age itself, but whether or not a person is practicing the correct exercises for his or her age. It may be easier for a five-year-old child to get used to the weaker eye’s workings by putting on a patch for four or eight hours a day as he or she plays. And truly, the brain has more plasticity when you’re five than when you’re seventy-five. But there are good, age-appropriate exercises you can do at anytime in your life that can change your visual system completely. 

BECOMING THE WORST PERSON YOU CAN BE!

Wouldn’t it be great to see the dead-end your “promising job” was going to lead to before you devoted some thirty-five fucking years of your life to that pointless tripe?

And just imagine if you could see the galactic loser your sweet bundle of joy would turn out to be—before you spent a couple hundred thousand dollars and the best years of your life raising his ridiculously disappointing ass?

Well, the same is true when you’re trying to pull off one of the biggest, most ambitious cons in the history of the art form. At the end of the day, a great con is not just about stealing millions of dollars via some underground computer hack (any egghead with no imagination can do that). No, this con was less about the size of the haul—and more about the scope of the crime. I had made enough loot. This was going to be the kind of swindle that would be talked about for years in the annals of con-dom (not the Trojan kind). Now, that’s what I was after. A certain level of immortality. And as you’ll see by reading this book, not only will I teach you the basics, but if you pay close attention, maybe take some notes in the margins, I might just show you how to steal an entire town.

And if you’re really, really good, after you’ve scammed them all, you may even end up beloved there.

I’m sure when you were little, there was some asshole adult figure in your life—a guidance counselor, a Big Brother, maybe even a super flirty priest—who told you some bullshit about “keeping your feet on the ground and reaching for the stars.” Or maybe that was Casey Kasem. Either way, it’s all garbage. “Trying your best” and “never giving up on your dreams” will usually lead to living a life well below the poverty line and playing rhythm guitar for a Maroon 5 cover band at Universal CityWalk. The only, and let me repeat that, only way to succeed in this life is to cheat. You don’t believe me? Henry Ford became an industrial success in good part because he sold to both sides during World War II (and yes, one of those sides was the fucking Nazis). Joseph Kennedy basically bought the US presidency for his son by using the immense profits from a very illegal bootlegging operation. And New York billionaire Leona Helmsley was once quoted as saying, “We don’t pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes.” (A New York federal court disagreed—and gave her eighteen months in prison, by the way.) And while Leona was an asshole for actually saying it out loud—the witch was right.

You see, I wrote this book not only to prove that anybody can become a con man, but also, and more importantly, that most extremely successful people are con men in their own right. I also wanted to show that the greatest con man in the world (hello, me) could accomplish anything if he put his mind to it. And not by reaching for the stars. Or being all I could be. But by using the library of skills I’m about to lay out for you, in detail, in the following pages. Which means you too can accomplish anything. You can con a whole town. And get rich while doing it. And, if you do it properly…you may even achieve something greater.

Because at the end of the day, this book is about winning at life. About getting everything you ever dreamed of. And oddly enough, it’s a sort of love story, too. About two people you’d never imagine would end up together in the end…ending up together in the end. So now that you know how the

story ends, how’s about we get back to where it begins…

               I stole my first car when I was three. That’s not a typo, folks. Three. Now, while I didn’t pull off the scam entirely by myself, I was certainly a semi-willing accomplice, or at least as willing as you can be, committing grand theft auto while still in pre-K. One of the first lessons to learn is that everything and everyone around you can always be used as potential tools to aid you in a grift. Maybe it’s a Michigan roll (a few dollar bills wrapped around a roll of Xerox paper). Maybe it’s a cackle-bladder (a squib of red dye you bite down on when you fake a slip-and-fall at Home Depot). Or maybe it’s one of the most commonly used tools in 

 the Game: a shill, also known as a capper (a seemingly innocent accomplice that makes people feel more comfortable when dealing with a total stranger—you).

It could be a dog with one leg. It could be an older person with a broken-down walker. Or it could be, as was the case in my first foray into the Game, a toddler.

People are generally trusting. I have no idea why that is. With all the history of cheating and deceiving that has been perpetrated over time, by individuals, religions, and just about every government that has ever existed on Earth, you’d think a healthy skepticism would have been ingrained in us, merely by natural selection. But luckily for guys like me, humankind remains genetically naive—dumb fuckers who may walk on two feet but still think like their ape ancestors. And sometimes all they need is a little push back to their more natural position: bent over on all fours.

Here’s a quick list of quality shills and cappers:

THE ELDERLY

Our country has decided to collectively deem old people useless and a burden on our society. I am here to tell you that notion is some totally ageist bullshit. I’ll agree that they’re super depressing to look at, and tend to repeat the same fond memories of the Korean conflict and institutionalized racism, but they do have a purpose in this world. A worthwhile function. A reason for taking that very dubious first breath every morning. And that purpose is to help you get over on somebody. Even if they’re unaware of it at the time. Especially if they’re unaware. Which is what makes being a confidence man a true art form. Any asshole can storm into a bank and rob the joint with an ironic mask and a half-decent submachine gun. But it takes a true artisan to enter that same bank armed only with an octogenarian in a wheelchair and take the place for triple what the Point Break guys made off with. So make friends with an oldie You’ll find it makes suffering through those long, boring stories about how the Hollywood Jews faked the moon landing well worth it.

The Sword

YOU GOT SOMETHING in the mail today, the man’s wife says. It looks like it’s from your uncle.

The man takes the package and holds it in his hands. He opens it.

Inside is a sword.

THIS sword was used by your great-great-great-grandfather during the Civil War, the man reads. I thought that you might like to have it.

Very nice of my uncle, the man says.

Yes, says his wife.

She goes back into the kitchen.

A sword, she says. Just what we need.

THE man holds the sword up. He looks around the room.

Honey? he says. Can we hang it on the wall?

What? says his wife. Are you kidding? If that thing falls, it could chop off your head!

The man thinks a moment.

What about in the basement? he says.

Oh, says his wife. That’d be fine.

THE man goes downstairs and turns on the light. He finds a good spot and gets a hammer and some nails.

Honey! he calls, when he’s got the sword up. You really should come down and see this!

I’m sure it looks nice, the man’s wife calls down.

The man reaches out and straightens it.

THE rest of the evening is pretty uneventful, but in bed that night, the man has a dream. In his dream, the man sees his great-great-great-grandfather—on a white horse, in the midst of a raging battle.

He’s holding the sword way high up over his head, and using it to point the way forward.

SO in the morning, when the man’s done eating his breakfast cereal, he opens the door and goes down into the basement. He stands there, staring at the sword on the wall. Slowly, he reaches out and lifts it off.

He weighs the blade thoughtfully and holds it out before him. He smiles—it feels good in his hand. He lunges and parries as best as he is able.

Maybe I should take lessons, he says.

SO the next day, the man goes to his first sword-fighting lesson. Not fencing, but sword fighting—the real thing.

The lessons are held in the instructor’s basement. The instructor is very, very strict.

None of you people have any talent at all! the instructor screams at the pupils.

Then he stops and watches the man for a while.

Well, you, he says. You might be somewhat capable.

THE man practices hard. He quickly gets good. He gets so good, he’s entered into a tournament. On the day of the event, the man comes in first place.

He is undefeated in combat. IN the audience, two people sit watching in amazement.

He’s only been practicing a few months, the first says. It’s almost incredible how he blossomed so quickly.

Well maybe he didn’t, the other says.

What? says the first. What do you mean?

There could be another explanation, the second says. What I mean to say is, it is just possible that he’s the reincarnation of a great, great swordsman.

Reincarnation? says the first. You believe in that stuff?

They both turn and look at the man.

And up there onstage, where he stands holding his trophy, the man overhears their whole exchange.

IS it possible that I am my great-great-great-grandfather? the man thinks, lying in bed that night. Is it possible that I’m him, reincarnated in this body? Reincarnated in me—in my mind?

And that night, when he sleeps, the man again dreams he sees his great-great-great-grandfather before him—still on the battlefield, now screaming a battle cry.

Now hacking about, stabbing and slashing.

THE next day, the man makes a phone call to his uncle.

Tell me about my great-great-great-grandfather, he says.

Well, says his uncle, what do you want to know?

Absolutely everything, the man says.

WELL, says his uncle, apparently he was quite dashing! But by all accounts, just a terrible man. He was a drunkard and a layabout. A failure in business. He abandoned four wives and ten children.

Well, says the man, what happened to him? I mean, you know, in the end?

In the end? says his uncle. He died in the gutter. But he was a great swordsman—that has to count for something!

THE man hangs up in the grip of mortal terror. He resolves right then and there to give up sword fighting. He resolves to improve himself, to become a better man, to do everything he can for his wife and children.

And that’s what he does. He gets a better job. He starts going to church; he becomes a Little League coach. And his work is rewarded: He is promoted three times, buys a new car, an RV, a bigger house. He takes his family on vacation to Disneyland, and the next year they go to Acapulco. He gets his picture in the paper shaking hands with the mayor. He teaches his whole family to play golf.

Isn’t life grand? the man says to his wife, lying in bed at night.

It certainly is, the man’s wife says.

And everything seems very, very nice.

BUT still, at night, the man has these dreams—these dreams that won’t go away. These dreams of his great-great-great-grandfather on the battlefield, hacking people apart. And as time passes, the dreams intensify; they don’t fade away as the man would’ve hoped. It gets to the point where he’s afraid to go to sleep; every night, the bloodshed gets worse. And, worse than that, the dreams have migrated from the battlefield—they’re here, now, in the modern age. They’re in the man’s town—in his neighborhood—on his lawn.

And now he himself is holding the blade.

AT that point, the man decides to stop sleeping; he just stays up, alone at the kitchen table. Sitting there, holding his head in his hands.

Praying that somehow it will end.

AND finally, one night, a knock comes at the door.

In a daze, the man opens up.

There on the porch is a stranger with a sword.

I’m here to challenge you to a duel, the stranger says.

I’m sorry, says the man. I don’t sword-fight anymore.

En garde! cries the stranger, and he lunges.

THE man stumbles backward into the house. He dives over the couch and flees down the hall. He digs his sword out from the back of the closet, turns to face the stranger, who’s slashing wildly about.

The two fight their way through the rooms of the house, then spill out onto the deck, across the yard. They fight across the grass, around the garden and the swimming pool, swords clashing, flashing in the dark.

The man is a talented sword fighter—very talented—but he’s out of practice, and the stranger is better. It doesn’t take long before the tip of the stranger’s sword is whittling away the man’s skin.

I give! yells the man. I give! I yield!

But the stranger just shakes his head.

You can’t yield, he says. This fight is to the death!

Please, have mercy! the man says.

Mercy? says the stranger. I don’t know what that means.

He knocks the man’s sword to the ground. He raises his own above his head for the killing blow.

But just then a shot rings out.

THE stranger freezes, then crumples to the ground. Blood pours forth from a bullet hole in his head.

The man looks over. His wife is on the back porch.

She’s holding a smoking gun in her hand.

HONEY, says the man. I didn’t know you had a gun.

His wife steps down from the porch. She moves across the lawn, tucking the gun into her robe.

Don’t be silly, she says. Of course.

OF course? says the man.

He frowns, then hears a noise. He turns and looks toward the fence. And there, on the other side, he sees his next-door neighbor, holding a crossbow in his hand.

Don’t worry, says the neighbor. We wouldn’t have let him get you.

The other neighbors are standing to the side. One has a flamethrower, and the other a pair of nunchucks. Another has brass knuckles on either hand.

The man stands there, staring.

His wife touches his arm.

It’s all right, she says. It’s all okay.

She smiles and gives the stranger’s body a kick.

Let’s get this in the ground, though, she says, before it starts to stink.

FOR a moment, the man looks at her. Then he nods his head. They bury the body and go back into their home.

They put away their weapons, and they turn out the lights.

And when they go to bed, the dreams don’t come