Should We Trust Our Gut Feelings?
100% trust is for fools
Freshly Squeezed Apple Juice
I have just had a glass of freshly squeezed apple juice. It is easily the best drink I’ve had in months. It isn’t like I have been on a fast: on the contrary, I’ve had the opportunity to drink good beer and wine, orange juice and many other decent beverages. Perhaps it is a matter of contrast between expectation and result: the apple juice had a suspicious and remarkably unappetising brown appearance that made me wrinkle my nose when I saw it. Indeed, I have this peculiar problem with apples and pears: I never feel like eating them. When I do, however, I always enjoy them as much as I do my favourite fruits. How stupid is it not to learn?
The Opposite Is Also True
Come to think about it, I also experience the opposite: feeling like doing something only to be disappointed once it is done. That restaurant never exceeds our expectations, but somehow it has us return again and again. That drink we think you want, but that is never that good. The fifth cup of coffee that has us on edge for the rest of the day. Oddly, some things are abnormally unappealing but highly rewarding, and others are tremendously appealing but regularly unsatisfying.
To be clear, I am not referring to objectively beneficial activities that are also…