1 . In our information-driven society, shaping our worldview through the media is similar to forming an opinion about someone solely based on a picture of their foot. While the media might not deliberately deceive us, it often fails to provide a comprehensive view of reality.

Consequently, the question arises: Where, then, shall we get our information from if not from the media? Who can we trust? How about experts- people who devote their working lives to understanding their chosen slice of the world? However, even experts can fall prey to the allure of oversimplification, leading to the “single perspective instinct” that hampers (阻碍) our ability to grasp the intricacies (错综复杂) of the world.

Simple ideas can be appealing because they offer a sense of understanding and certainty. And it is easy to take off down a slippery slope, from one attention-grabbing simple idea to a feeling that this idea beautifully explains, or is the beautiful solution for, lots of other things. The world becomes simple that way.

Yet, when we embrace a singular cause or solution for all problems, we risk oversimplifying complex issues. For instance, championing the concept of equality may lead us to view all problems through the lens of inequality and see resource distribution as the sole panacea. However, such rigidity prevents us from seeing the multidimensional nature of challenges and hinders true comprehension of reality. This “single perspective instinct” ultimately clouds our judgment and restricts our capacity to tackle complex issues effectively. Being always in favor of or always against any particular idea makes you blind to information that doesn’t fit your perspective. This is usually a bad approach if you would like to understand reality.

Instead, constantly test your favorite ideas for weaknesses. Be humble about the extent of your expertise. Be curious about new information that doesn’t fit, and information from other fields. And rather than talking only to people who agree with you, or collecting examples that fit your ideas, consult people who contradict you, disagree with you, and put forward different ideas as a great resource for understanding the world. If this means you don’t have time to form so may opinions, so what?

Wouldn’t you rather have few opinions that are right than many that are wrong?

3 . “Two centuries ago, Lewis and Clark left St. Louis to explore the new lands acquired in the Louisiana Purchase,” George W. Bush said, announcing his desire for a program to send men and women to Mars. They made that journey in the spirit of discovery. America has ventured forth into space for the same reasons.

Yet there are vital differences between Lewis and Clark’s expedition and a Mars mission. First, they were headed to a place where hundreds of thousands of people were already living. Second, they were certain to discover places and things of immediate value to the new nation. Third, their venture cost next to nothing by today’s standards. A Mars mission may be the single most expensive non-wartime undertaking in U.S. history.

Appealing as the thought of travel to Mars is, it does not mean the journey makes sense, even considering the human calling to explore. And Mars as a destination for people makes absolutely no sense with current technology.

Present systems for getting from Earth’s surface to low-Earth orbit are so fantastically expensive that merely launching the 1,000 tons or so of spacecraft and equipment a Mars mission would require could be accomplished only by cutting health-care benefits, education spending, or other important programs—or by raising taxes. Absent (缺乏)some remarkable discovery, astronauts, geologists, and biologists once on Mars could do little more than analyze rocks and feel awestruck (敬畏的) staring into the sky of another world. Yet rocks can be analyzed by automated probes without risk to human life, and at a tiny portion of the cost of sending people.

It is interesting to note that when President Bush unveiled (公开) his proposal, he listed these recent major achievements of space exploration: pictures of evidence of water on Mars, discovery of more than 100 planets outside our solar system, and study of the soil of Mars. All these accomplishments came from automated probes or automated space telescopes. Bush’s proposal, which calls for reprogramming some of NASA’s present budget into the Mars effort, might actually lead to a reduction in such unmanned science—the one aspect of space exploration that’s working really well.

Rather than spend hundreds of billions of dollars to hurl (投) tons toward Mars using current technology, why not take a decade or two or however much time is required researching new launch systems and advanced propulsion (推进力)? If new launch systems could put weight into orbit affordably, and advanced propulsion could speed up that long, slow transit (运输) to Mars, the dream of stepping onto the red planet might become reality. Mars will still be there when the technology is ready.

4 . The other night I had dinner with my friend Kim, who in midlife is trying to change her career. She has spent decades as a successful photographer, but she knows it’s time to do something different. What, however, is she qualified to do, besides photography? “I’m good at parties,” she told me with a shrug. “And parallel parking.” We refilled our wineglasses and laughed really hard as we dreamed up the various careers in which that particular combination might be useful.

Here’s a humbling exercise: Ask yourself what you’re good at, aside from the skills you use at work. After my conversation with Kim, I put this question to a handful of friends and got responses ranging from “finding restaurants for people” to “spotting terrific old chairs.” The more I think about my own answer to this question, the more confused I seem to get.

A year ago this month I left a job, and a career, that brought me great satisfaction for more than two decades. Can serendipity(意外惊喜)be a strategy? It certainly worked for me. I happened to find a field in which my skills and the requirements of the job were a Venn diagram (韦恩图) with near total overlap. Like most of my friends, I spent my 20s and 30s marching determinedly along my given path, working hard, with purpose, and by the time I reached my 40s, I was able to enjoy the fruits of my labor. Isn’t that the way the American Dream goes?

Here’s what you learn when you wake up from that dream: hubris (自负) is the unpleasant by-product of success. If you are really good at your job for a long enough time, you begin to believe that you can be good at any job and therefore can easily jump from one thing to another, switching horses in midstream. Examples of this mistaken thinking are everywhere, from the harmlessly frivolous (Dancing With the Stars) to the dangerously serious (the current presidency). As it turns out, humility is its own kind of skill; developing it hurts, but falling on your face hurts more.

Over the years a number of 20-somethings have come to me for advice, which I have dutifully given: Work hard, meet lots of people, say yes to many things. Don’t complain, put a smile on your face, and remind yourself that studying Foucault for four years in college might not prove to be particularly relevant in the working world. Swallow your pride and ask a lot of questions.

What I should be telling the young and ambitious is this: being really good at one thing is fantastic until it isn’t. The day may come, in my experience, will come, when you know you want to do, want to be, something else. For example, 20-somethings, one day you might want to appear on Dancing With the Stars. I’m not sure if Sean Spicer is a fool or a genius for turning down this opportunity for his first post-Administration performance. Maybe he’s not aware that Apolo Ohno was placed first on the show.

Or maybe you’ll want to run for President. Never mind that it was a President–Abraham Lincoln–who popularized the warning about switching horses in midstream. If you are a real estate tycoon and loud-mouthed TV star who made a name for yourself with a combination of instinct, bravado(虚张声势)and riding the wave of chaos you create everywhere you go, then who cares what Abe Lincoln said? The White House is the logical next career step.

Or, 20-somethings, maybe you’ll do both! At the same time! After all, doesn’t today’s White House sort of resemble Dancing With the Stars, if you squint(眯眼)hard and use your imagination? With experts and amateurs working together, trying to make it all look graceful while the audience alternatively laughs and cries?

So, folks, an assignment: Ask yourself what you’re good at. As for me, aside from what I most recently did for a living–writing, editing, managing people and showing up to meetings on time–my greatest strengths seem to be making vacation packing lists and remembering which houses in my town are on the market. So I have entered this next phase of my life with gratitude (for what I’ve accomplished), humility (about all that I don’t know) and fear (see random greatest strengths). I used to be filled with optimism: if Donald Trump could become President, anything seemed possible. But with each passing month, and each new failure, my optimism dims. If he wanted to try something new, wouldn’t Dancing With the Stars have been a wiser choice?