On Probability
I still don’t know what’s best for me. They say, when you’re over 25 years old, I’ve should’ve achieved major breakthrough in my life. I should’ve understand how the world works, know what to say and when to say it, and all of that are skills I’ve unlocked by my age, but it’s not. Most of the time I think I’m falling behind my peers, like how could they manage their job and family at the same time? Don’t they feel overwhelmed when they can’t have some alone time? Do they really enjoying their lives? And by doing this, I made my point how stupid I can be by comparing my preferences with theirs.
You might ask, “Why you really want to figure out life? Why can’t just enjoy it?”. Ha! I found another stupid people like me! Look, the main answer is because I don’t know. I don’t know that life should be figured out or not, should I enjoy my life or ruin it by becoming someone with high pay, but hate her job? I don’t know. All the possibilities are intriguing for me and I want to taste a bit of everything, just like food-sample they give at grocery stores. I want to taste all of them and it seems right by me, but I know I’m stupid, that’s why I’m asking whether or not I’m on the right path.
The first time I learnt about probability was at 2nd year of highschool. I hated it because that’s the only time when my math quiz score below the acceptable standard. I hated it not only because I didn’t like the teacher who’s too strict for nothing, but also I hated because I felt like I understood the concept, it’s just I couldn’t solve the math equation. Fast forward, I major in psychology, and there I was with the beloved enemy, statistic and probability. Yet, this time I pushed myself to undestand both the concept and the calculation trivialities — done manually when there’re many softwares dedicated just to do that. Hey, there I think probability might be useful in my life.
If life were a box of chocolate, it would take time before we’re able to eat all of them. There are many factors might influence, for example how many people were eating, what their preferences would be, and who’s the owner of the box? The point is, no matter how much I want to taste all of the chocolates, there’s high probability that I couldn’t do it. Wishful thinking wouldn’t help me reaching my goal and forcing myself to death might only increase small odds of me eating the chocolate, in other words, might only add one or two additional chocolates.
Today, the stupid chocolate eater a.k.a me, understands that there’s a limit of how many things I can do in life. My life choices determines the probability of options available to me and whatever I do will predict what I would do in the future and how people would react. Knowing this somewhat frees me because as long as I know what I want and do accordingly, it will increase my odds of getting what I value in life. It means I can explore many things, try short and small, to find what I can’t leave behind.
I am 26 now and I did a lot of mistakes which not only hurt myself, but also hurt others. I barely know what’s best for myself, feeling unease to small-talk with strangers, and still most of the time feel falling behind my peers in terms of social skills. Yet, today I feel like I’m exactly where I belong. I want to do a lot of things, unrelated to one another, for the sake of doing it. I might not make any sense for those who plan their life seriously and think that there’s always an age limit of what people can do, but I don’t mind. They might measure the probability on safety, meanwhile me on authenticity. We both measure things in life, we both measure what we value the most. Isn’t it nice?
