Undefiniteness

I recently reread 0 to 1 by Peter Thiel because I realized I needed to understand the concept of definite/undefinite pessimist/optimist. I think it’s an underrated book, there are a lot of concepts that can be seen from another perspective if we replace ‘my start-up’ with ‘myself as an individual’. For example, the concept of avoiding competition by becoming a monopoly may be very useful to people who work as professionals, in their case the start-up is themselves.

Thiel uses the definite/undefinite concept to define countries’ approach to the future (China – definite pessimist, EU – undefinite pessimist, US until ’60 – definite optimists, US now – definite optimists). Personally, I think such concept applied to individuals makes even more sense. How is your approach to life, to future planning? Are you a definite/undefinite pessimist/optimist? I wondered about myself and I realized I have been undefinite most of the time in my life: undefinite pessimist but sometimes a undefinite optimist. To better explain what I mean with undefinite/definite approach to life I will show some examples.

Until one day, after rereading the concepts of definite/undefinite pessimist/optimist in 0 to 1 I wondered about myself and my life. I realized I have lived as undefinite all the time. I have never made a medium or even a long-term plan. I even didn’t know how is it to work for a plan that is not short term. Couldn’t conceptualize it. Can you really make a medium or even a long-term plan happen? There are so much eventualities that may happen during the time, the world might be changing in a way you can’t predict. Therefore, every plan that is not short term is doomed to fail. That is the mentality my parents and the environment where I grew up taught to me. In Albania people seldom make life plans. The turmoils after the fall of communism and the fast growing and changing economy after the regime gave people the impression the future was too unpredictable. That’s not true in Western Europe, where it feels like nothing is changing. Therefore, I started to realize I was wrong in not making any concrete plans, in working and then “let’s see what happens”.

I don’t think I’m alone at this, actually in the environment I actually live in Italy I’m definitely not alone in this life approach. When I asked people what do you do after graduating everybody said: you prepare your CV and send dozens even hundreds copies to companies that may hire you and then, by chance, you get hired somewhere. I thought that sounds as an absurdity, an amazing absurdity. You give your future to the chance. How awful is that? I think one has to understand what she likes to do, study the market, define a handful of companies that seem more appropriate to her preferences and try hard to be hired in one of those. I’m writing this article because I realized that many people, especially young people, live their lives in a undefinite way as I did. I wonder is that really hard to make a long-term life plan? We are often taught into this undefinite mentality since we are children, especially in Europe where schools are far less specialized: kids have to learn as much as possible because who can predict the future? And then while we get a job, we work hard often without planning what to do next. I’ve noticed in big companies people work so that maybe they will get an increase in career, without having a specific aim or plan. In Italy I often hear the phrase “ you should work hard because that may increase opportunities, someone may notice you, something might happen”. It’s such a undefinite mindset.

But at a certain point in life this approach has to stop, I think the sooner the better. Successful people tend to be very focused and often they were like that since they were children. The fact that the future is not entirely predictable is not a reason to give up planning because giving up planning is like removing all your agency. Reminds me another concept in 0 to 1: a bad plan is better than no plan at all. Life is too short to be lived without having a specific aim. When I made this realization I for the first time started to wonder about long-term life plan, and during the moment I was defining the plan I felt like maybe finally my real life has started. I thought about Peter Thiel’s phrase about the best way to live your life as you are going to die tomorrow is to live it as you will live forever. It is his only quote that I never understood while reading his book. It sounds so paradoxical and strange. How can living your life as you are going to live forever be like living your life as you are going to die tomorrow? But in that moment, I felt like I finally understood it. Having a long- term plan for yourself is like giving a meaning to your life, it is like living for real. 

Maybe the best way to live as you will die tomorrow is to have a long-term plan; it is to live as you are going to live forever.