True warriors know that they cannot know the future. True warriors can predict the future, but know that they could be wrong. While the human mind cannot see clearly looking forward in time, hindsight is 20/20. When we look back and notice or identify certain salient facts, it feels like connecting the dots and saying “Eureka! That’s why that happened!” In psychology, this fallacy is called the attribution bias. We then look forward and say, “Let’s do that again, so we get more of the same!” This is the confirmation bias at work. The real problem, of course, is that the future is fundamentally unknowable. We can predict, fairly accurately, what will happen in the next few seconds. We can know, somewhat accurately, what will happen in the next few minutes. It starts getting very fuzzy within hours, and you can forget about accuracy altogether when we start talking days, weeks, months, and years. At that point, we are guessing, and usually guessing wrong.

Why do true warriors need to understand this, and know it to be an undeniable fact? So that they can disregard all predictions and focus only on what is working. The true warrior immediately stops doing what is shown to be not working—as a result of testing, tweaking, watching, talking, challenging, and observing what is done—not because of what is said. What the human mind excels at is real-time pattern recognition. Spend your energy in the now! Tomorrow is invisible, and the past lets us lie to ourselves with maximum conviction!

You are warriors and you will increase your power, skill, strength, and status through validated learning—empirical data derived from controlled testing. You will become champions and become impervious to the tricks of the mind. This will allow you to prevail, and as one who prevails, you will enjoy your future. No more guessing! So it has been written.