“People think focus means saying yes to the thing you’ve got to focus on. But that’s not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. You have to pick carefully. I’m actually as proud of the things we haven’t done as the things I have done. Innovation is saying no to 1,000 things.”
Choosing quality over quantity means that you’re more invested in choosing things that can stand the test of time over choosing many things that could easily fall apart. It’s a concept that applies to many areas of life.
“At the root of hypocrisy is a strong desire to be loved and accepted. The fear of humility and judgment is so powerful, that we use doublethink and cognitive dissonance to avoid facing ourselves.”
“The male ego can in some cases be tied to how and where a man sees his place in the world and whether he’s living up to expectations — his and those of society.
Cultural stereotypes for men can be intricately tied to both the inflation and deflation of the male ego. Some men measure themselves by the answers to the following questions:
Am I strong enough? Am I wealthy enough? Do I meet the traditional definition of masculinity? Do I attract women? Do I control things or people? Do people recognize me for these things and am I respected and revered for them?”
“What’s so interesting is that we seem to intuitively understand that if we can get ourselves to believe something first, we’ll be more effective at getting others to believe it,” says William von Hippel, a psychologist at The University of Queensland, who co-authored the study. “So we process information in a biased fashion, we convince ourselves, and we convince others. The beauty is, those are the steps Trivers outlined—and they all lined up in one study.”
