Don't Trust Your Gut: Using Data to Get What You Really Want in Life

In dating, how many of us get stuck in our own heads, thinking that we have no chance with a man or woman we want to date? How many of us don’t ask the guy or girl out because we think they are out of our league? How many of us think that we are “garbage” or that we risk embarrassing ourselves by asking certain people out?

In the U.S., women rated earning capacity, arguably one of the most meaningful byproducts of a sense of purpose, as important nearly twice as often as men. American women rated ambition and industriousness as important with much greater frequency than men.

When it comes to making financial decisions, what should matter are opportunity costs, the true benefit a purchase provides, and the real pleasure we receive from it compared to other ways we could spend our money.

Numbers can be seductive. We can grow fixated with them, and in so doing we can lose sight of more important considerations.

Let’s start here: The single most effective way to statistically maximize success is to avoid marrying too young or too old. The five-year probability of divorce is highest among couples who marry younger than the age of 20 (31 percent) and lowest between the ages of 30 and 32 (9 percent). Those probabilities begin to rise slightly after the age of