Success isn't only effort — luck and risk matter: The Psychology of Money #3

About this episode

Do you think success is all down to effort and ability? In this episode, The Psychology of Money #3, we talk about two things few personal finance books are willing to face head-on: luck and risk.

Starting from Bill Gates and Lakeside School, and a friend of his who was just as brilliant but died in an accident, you'll see that success and failure often aren't about differences in ability, but about probability and timing.

In this episode you'll hear: • Why decisions that look brilliant in hindsight were often just luck at the time • How much of your investment returns comes from skill, and how much from simply being on the right side • Why you shouldn't idolize outliers, but build a strategy for "surviving long enough" • How I think about risk and preparation in my own real estate and ETF investing • Why investing in the whole market for the long run lets luck slowly come over to your side

If you're investing or managing money, or have ever doubted yourself after "missing an opportunity," this episode will help you "be more humble about success and more forgiving of failure."

It will help you see that it isn't that you're not good enough; the odds you faced were different.

The Psychology of Money series continues, helping you build a FIRE approach to money that lasts and holds steady.

The episode is in Mandarin Chinese. These notes are translated from my original show notes.