Someone says to you: “Oysters make me throw up.” You ask if they’re allergic or something, and they don’t know; it turns out, they threw up the first time they had oysters, so they made that association and stuck with it. They’ve never had an oyster since.
We do this all the time, and often with things far more important than just our preference for a particular food. We had our first job in finance and it burned us out and we had a terrible shark of a manager, so we decided “Finance is stressful and full of jerks,” and then we cut it off forever. And hey, maybe it is! But we don’t know; n=1.
Some people do that sort of dangerous association in an even more extreme manner: “I had my first job anywhere and it burned me out and I had a terrible shark of a manager, so jobs are stressful and full of jerks.”
You see how jumping to that conclusion might end up worsening that person’s overall life?
Some things are inherently a little stressful and a little hard to get right the first time. Working, dating, building something of value. That means you’re going to have initial struggles and setbacks – and if you let those things define the entire category, you’re going to miss many opportunities to achieve something meaningful.
The Opportunity Machine 