There's really no such thing as a sure thing, but oh dear God how we wish there was.

Everybody's looking for it. We want guarantees. "If I do this, it's sure to work."

I remember Jordan Belfort doing something on stage where he asked the audience to raise their hands if they would work their asses off for three years if they knew with 100% certainty that they would end up super rich.

Everybody raises their hand. Of course. Duh. You can take a little sweat, a little sacrifice, when you know for sure that you're going to be successful.

Then he asks, what if there was only a 50% chance that it would work?

A few hands go down, but most stay up.

What if it was only 25%?

10%?

5%?

1%?

When he gets down to under 25%, hands start going down rapidly.

Only a few people say they'd be willing to work 16+ hour days for three years if there was only a 1% chance they would be successful.

That sounds like a bad bargain. And even those with their hands still up, who knows who'd actually be willing to do it in the real world?

We want insurance and assurance. We want sure things.

The reality is that you can't know. There's no such thing as a sure thing.

Our dishwasher broke, it made weird noises and water started flowing across the kitchen floor. We called the insurance company and because of their weird mathematic formulas, it turns out that it'd be cheaper just to get a new one. Something about taking off x% of the replacement cost for every year since we bought the old one, etc.

Well, how's that for insurance. We're paying for situations exactly like this, and it turns out we weren't actually insured. We're paying for air.

So then I thought, what if an insurance company abandoned their fancy formulas and just kept what they promised? I know that technically, they don't promise these things, there's the fine print. But what are people paying for? Insurance companies implicitly say "we'll take care of you if something happens."

We're paying to feel safe, but when the shit hits the fan, we aren't.

So what if there was an insurance company that actually had their customer's backs instead of using math loopholes to get out of keeping their word.

They'd be able to charge a premium. People would pay way more if they knew they were covered all the time.

And they'd also snag up all the customers, because they deliver a better service.

They'd be the only real player in town, because they'd be the only one who could deliver real insurance. Maybe they'd even be human and treat people like people. What a revolutionary concept.

Look, I'm just thinking about this as a conceptual business and marketing concept, I'm not butthurt and angry at the insurance people. If you read my book, you know I believe what happened was the best thing that could possibly happen. So for those new to this blog, I'm not resentful or any bullshit like that. I find this whole ordeal more amusing than anything.

Anyway, that'd be cool, wouldn't it? An insurance company not filled with slime balls? And what company wouldn't like being legitimately able to charge premium prices and get all the customers?

I don't know if this is really reasonable, but if it isn't, what's the point of any insurance company?

Lesson of the day: you want insurance, but you can't have it. Whether that is in your work or with your broken dishwasher. All you can do is hustle, execute every day, and trust that when the time is right, the right thing will happen.

Oh, and I made a new cover + title for the aforementioned book of mine. Check it out. And get a copy if you haven't yet.