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11/ Political ambitions I think are higher. A local election bid is like 1 child if you win. National-level is like 2. President=10
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12/ The trick to baby equivalent things is that *if* they succeed, they demand particular levels of attention/commitment for rest of life
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13/ So we actually bring the same kind of thinking to managing ambition as we do to child-rearing and ask similar questions
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15/ Answering my own q about why we lower sights through life in general if we're not winning egregiously, baby-economics provides answer
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16/ Merely making money is a close-ended problem to be solved, whether your horizon is the next month, the next year or retirement stash
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17/ A baby or baby-equivalent though is an open-ended commitment where it only makes sense if you are willing to plan for success
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18/ It is fine to view paychecks as just a close-ended way to pay bills. It's dumb *not* to wish a book to be open-ended success
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19/ Similarly, close-ended "3x flip in 2 years" startup logic doesn't work for same reason "have baby and kill it at age 3" doesn't work
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20/ So ambition is best understood as your personal process of budgeting for *open-ended* commitments through life, predicated on success
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22/ You rationally estimate that your available rest-of-life open-ended best-case attention budget for "one more kid" gets lower with age
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23/ So to summarize: measure your ambitions in baby-equivalent units and take on what you think you can actually raise if successful
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