Statistics are like bikinis.  What they reveal is suggestive, but what they conceal is vital. –Aaron Levenstein

This image has a double meaning.  Know what it is?

I told a coworker one of my ex-students had found a passion for freerunning. He turned to me, crinkled his brow, and said, “You can’t make a living doing that.”

I turned to him, crinkled my brow, and asked, “What if Tony Hawk came up to you and said he was going to make it big as a skateboarder. What would you say then?”

My coworker’s response was interesting but represents the sentiment of most people. Would you say something like this?  “I’d tell him that the chances of making any living in that is very small. Maybe 5 out of 1000 people would make it,” he said.

I don’t know where he got that statistic, but his point was simple. There’s so many people who’d want to make it in skateboarding that the chances are close to impossible.

The average human has one breast and one testicle.  –Des McHale

I told him that statistics mean nothing, that any reliance on those lies is a reliance on your ownlimitation.

He then countered with a really good counter. So good was his counter that I had to think hard in my counter to counter his counter. Are we counting how many times I used counter?

“Tony Hawk was lucky,” he said.

I think if he said that to Hawk, he’d slap him. Hell. I’d slap him.

To say anyone is lucky does two things. One, the skill and hard work people put into their success means nothing. Two, people are powerless to live their lives. Take what you get, cuz you ain’t gonna get any better.

To accomplish anything in life worth having, a person needs to take the first step. And many times it requires a sense of courage in the face of failure. There was a lot of talk in the nineties to the turn of the century about the fear of success. But that took away from the very real fear of failure.

Torture numbers, and they’ll confess to anything.  –Gregg Easterbrook

And when you rely on statistics, which can be manipulated to represent anything that anyone wants, you give your power away to live your life the way you want.

This is the basic choice of my hero’s journey in my book. Does he let someone else determine his life and the lives of his province? Or does he choose to fight for a life of freedom?

Ultimately, we all have to choose. Too often I see people choosing the “easy” way out, like relying on stats so they don’t have to go out and follow their passions. Follow your passions, for they may lead to great things.

Say you were standing with one foot in the oven and one foot in an ice bucket.  According to the percentage people, you should be perfectly comfortable.  –Bobby Bragan, 1963

I’d received a frantic phone call from my student’s parent.  My student and his parents were having deep issues on his choice for a university.  And they’ve been arguing in circles, unable to come to an understanding of each other.

The next day I went over to their home and mediated.  The parents had significant concerns regarding their son’s decision process.  Keep in mind that he has a bouquet of Ivy Leagues in front of him to choose from.  He’d narrowed it down to three schools.  His parents, in their minds, narrowed it down to one.  That one university had better statistics regarding retention of freshmen and transference to graduate schools.

However, I saw that my student had already made his choice.  I kept that to myself.

The conflict was simple.  The parents based their knowledge of their favored university through guides and statistics.  My student based his choice on how he connected to the people and the university when he visited there on his college tour.

His parents didn’t understand how he could make a monumental decision based on feeling.  He didn’t understand why they wouldn’t accept his intuition.  Neither party listened to each other, or talked each other’s language.

I fully supported my student’s intuitive decision, but also supported his parents’ point of view.  So I translated what they were saying to each other.

So what’s the point?

There are two.

No matter where you go to get your education, it’s not the school that makes the person, it’s the person that makes the person.

When I was at the crappy martial arts school (see my bio), my fellow instructors always made fun of other martial arts, their weaknesses, their form, their kiai—yell (rolling my eyeballs).  What I learned, especially from watching people fight, is that there are two components to winning.  Skill and mental toughness.  But if you had all the skill in the world and no mental toughness, then you might as well lie down and die.  Because, when skill levels are equal, it’s the person that has grit that usually pulls the win.

Isn’t that life?  What do people always say?  Life’s a marathon not a sprint.  Not that life has to be hard.  But you have to delve into your work, be it raising children, building a bridge, writing a book, to succeed.  Then you have to continue your work once you do.

Side note:  Do what you love, and love what you do.

So once my student, who’s already smarter than I, gets his Ivy League education, it’s his grit, love for his work that will make him a great man.

The second point is never believe in statistics.  In this case, the parents’ top choice statically had greater retention of freshmen and graduate school transfers. However, the stats don’t say what my student will do, nor do they represent how well he’ll do.

In the end, peace fell upon the house, and my student will go to the school he wants to go to.  To him, whom I’ve worked with for many years, I only wish you the best.