Question 1

Is it necessary to be intelligent to succeed in life?

Emily Balcetis · Accepted Answer

Intelligence comes in many forms. Some people are more socially skilled than others. Some have incredible memories while others do not. Some have musical intelligence, linguistic abilities, or physical prowess that others lack.

But perhaps more important for success is the mindset individuals hold for how they approach the development of their own skill set. Believing that you are born or endowed with a unique talent is actually limiting and impedes the odds of success. It might feel good for a while to think you were born with an innate ability in math. But if you experience a set back or fail at a test of your analytic abilities, the implication is you have lost your talent or never had the best of it to begin with.

A more useful mindset is one of growth. Obstacles are opportunities to learn new approaches. Setbacks are chances to think of a different or creative way forward. Failures are chances to invite others to join the team to collaborate on innovative reformulations. They are not indicators of an individuals natural-born talents.

Success is more likely when we adopt a mindset that intelligence can be grown, developed, and nurtured. We increase the odds of getting what we want out of life if we believe skill sets and abilities can emerge through investment in effective techniques for learning and seek out support from individuals who are able to offer mentorship.

Question 2

Does education really matter to somebody's success?

Emily Balcetis · Accepted Answer

Charlie Munger co-created and serves as the vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway. In the last thirty years, Berkshire’s share price has risen by more than 4,000 percent, outperforming the S&P 500 Index six times over across that the same time frame. And that’s not counting dividends. But Munger did not complete his undergraduate education. He has never taken a course in business, economics, or accounting.

Munger's insights are the result his own self-education. He has written about his background. To teach himself what he needed to know in business, he read historical records of the organizational dynamics of the process that created the U.S. Constitution. He studied the communication strategies used by the CEOs of lucrative oil refineries. He studied the motivational principles of Alcoholics Anonymous, airline pilot training, and clinical instruction in medical schools. He noticed patterns of rationality and irrationality in people’s judgments that contributed to their success and failures. And this knowledge, he argues, is the key to some of the most important decisions he's ever made with Berkshire Hathaway.

It's true that education does generally lead to what some might call financial success. Georgetown University's Center on Education and the Workforce has found people with a Bachelor's degree earn 84% more than people with only a high school degree. Education comes for many people through formal training. But for others, like Charlie Munger, it can come from an individual motivation and personal commitment to learning. And that, for him and for many others with similar stories, was the key to success.

Question 3

Which is better, long-term goals or short-term goals?

Emily Balcetis · Accepted Answer

Both!

It is important to set long-term goals. But it is essential that we connect our current actions to those distant futures, to understand and accept the importance of today's choices with tomorrow's outcomes. We can do this by also setting short-term goals.

Want to clear that credit card debt by the end of the year? That long-term goal will likely only be met by setting reasonable monthly savings targets.

Want to lose 20 pound before the summer? You can't do it by cramming your weight loss plans into the final month of spring. It is necessary to set realistic goals for each month between now and then.

Question 4

How to deal with fear of failure?

Emily Balcetis · Accepted Answer

Try shedding the word failure from our self assessments of progress and possibilities. Fearing failure leads us to avoid risk, and to avoid decisions and actions where the outcomes are uncertain. But trying something big or new is how we learn, and how innovation happens. Try instead to think of missteps, mistakes, or "failures" as opportunities for growth. X, the division of Google responsible for some of the companies' most exciting inventions, embraces the possibility that an idea might not fly and encourages individuals and teams to help one another identify fatal flaws. If a project is a killed off, the people who created the concept aren't fired or demoted; often, they are rewarded with time off to brainstorm or a financial bonus to invest in a new idea. Fearing failure is a mindset that holds us back. Practice embracing the idea that failure is not an indication of inherent ability. Replace your mindset with this one: Failure is an opportunity to learn from the past and find a new direction forward.

Question 5

How do successful people see the world compared to those who aren't successful?

Emily Balcetis · Accepted Answer

There is no perfect formula for looking at the world to ensure success. But flexibility is important. So, here are 4 tactics that successful people use, that we can all lean to employ, that give us options when our default way of approaching our goals is not working.

1. NARROW FOCUS: When we need an extra boost of energy and motivation to cross the finish line, finish the job, or close out a project, eliminating distractions is key. For example, exercisers who focused on a goal, like the windows on the tall building up ahead, when walking saw their finish line as closer, walked faster, and said it hurt less than people who looked around more broadly.

2. WIDE BRACKET: Expanding our field of view can reveal broader patterns that are less apparent when we consider decisions or events in isolation. For example, when we save for retirement, we are investing in a future that usually is fairly far off. The goal is to find long-term gains over and above any short-term losses our portfolio might suffer, and market analysts have found that the best way to accomplish this is to invest in stocks rather than bonds. Equities have a much higher rate of return than fixed-income securities, in the long run. However, many of us struggle to keep our money in them. One reason for the reticence to hold stocks is that novice investors peek too often at their portfolio and are scared by what they find. They narrowly focus on the changes in daily stock valuation. Stocks naturally rise and fall throughout the course of a day or week or month. Try to resist making decisions based on what we see any one day and instead decide based on what appears in a year to date analysis. By adopting a wide bracket, we may find our affinity for equities growing and our retirement wallets a bit thicker.

3. FRAMING: We act on what we see. So, think conscientiously about what you put in your line of sight. Trying to eat healthier? Put the fruits in a bowl on the counter, and hide the beer out of sight in the back of the fridge. Google tried a version of this and found that employees consumed tens of thousands of calories less in a week. Trying to exercise more? Leave the sneakers at the foot of the bed rather than slippers to encourage movement in the morning and keep the yoga mat on the floor rather than the closet.

4. MATERIALIZE: Make concrete and visual what we might otherwise keep in our heads and memory. Forgetting to schedule the appointment? Schedule a time with yourself in your calendar during the day to make the call. Trying to increase your savings? Track how much you are setting aside from each paycheck and chart your progress. Set a reminder in your calendar to check your chart every two months to review your efforts and reset your savings goals.

Question 6

Do open-minded people have a different visual perception of reality?

Emily Balcetis · Accepted Answer

I'd like to think about the question flipped around. Do different visual perceptions create open-mindedness? The answer is yes.

We can teach ourselves to look at the world in ways that do not come naturally and we open ourselves up to seeing different perspectives and getting a fuller, richer, and more accurate sense of what is actually true.

For example, in research my team and I conducted, we found using eye tracking technology that when people watch a video of two individuals interacting, observers tend to focus their attention on one person more than the other. But they don't realize they have watched the video with this bias. The consequence, though, is that they miss some important information about what the other person did and said. The come away having only gotten some of the facts. Their perspective is ill informed, and their thoughts and decisions are wrong.

But, we can teach ourselves to open up our field of view. To look with a wider perspective. To intentionally search for things we would not naturally try to see. As a result, we gain a better understanding of what is really happening, what the facts really are, and our decisions are better made.

Question 7

To anticipate challenge and see failure comes naturally to me. My friends and colleagues call me pessimistic. Is this all bad or am I better trying to be an optimistic go-getter?

Emily Balcetis · Accepted Answer

It's not an either / or answer. There are benefits to both qualities and in fact holding both optimistic and pessimistic perspectives in moderation might be most beneficial for fostering motivation. Consider this. A great formula for setting goals is to (1) dream big, (2) plan concretely, and (3) foreshadow failure. Optimism is likely beneficial at step 1, when considering what it is you really want to accomplish. What does success look like to you? Both optimism and pessimism are helpful at step 2, when thinking exactly about what you can do today, tomorrow, this week, to take steps in the right direction. And pessimism is useful at step 3, when considering the obstacles you might experience on the path to goal completion and the strategies you might employ should you experience those obstacles. People who stop setting goals after step 1 are less likely to meet their goals because they are not prepared for the hard work of actually pursuing their goals. So, the take away, try to cultivate both your pessimism and optimism and use them for their best purpose.

Question 8

Is it better to visualize or write down your goals?

Emily Balcetis · Accepted Answer

Visualizing your goals, or daydreaming as some might consider it to be, is a good first step to setting a goal. But writing them down in some way--a list, a collection of images or phrases pulled from magazines and arranged on a page--might be better. That list or collection holds us accountable to what we've promised to ourselves. Try putting that list or collection of images in a place where you will conscientiously can be reminded of it every day. Perhaps, next to your mirror where you brush your teeth twice a day for two minutes.

Even better is to pair that statement of your goals with a concrete plan of action. Write down what steps you need to take today, tomorrow, next week, next month to make it across your finish line. What obstacles might stand in your way and what will you do to get around those?

Research finds that people who pair statements of their lofty dreams with concrete plans of actions are more likely to find the energy and motivation they need to increase the odds of success.

Question 9

What is a key tip to making New Year's resolutions stick? Especially around diet and exercise?

Emily Balcetis · Accepted Answer

Two tips. First, set moderately challenging but not impossible goals. Research shows that we give up on plans even before we get started when we appraise a goal as beyond our means to accomplish. Also don't set goals that are too easy. We won't find inspiration to continue working on a goal from meeting a goal that we knew was in the bag, that we were certain any person including ourselves could achieve.

Second, hold ourselves accountable everyday and review progress every week or two. Tracking what we exercise we've done today or what we ate for each meal gives us real data on how we are doing. Then aggregate those daily data points and check how you did across each week or every two weeks. One day might be a blip--maybe we did better or worse than the usual. And one day won't make or break a resolution. But reviewing over larger units of time can give us a more accurate sense of how frequent our blips are. Reviewing daily data each week can help to overcome our faulty memories that might otherwise focus us too often on our mistakes or erase them.

Question 10

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