Loserthink summary

We often look to the past to find patterns or meaning that might help guide us in our lives. Yet many of us fall into the trap of relying too much on the past. After all, in many cases, history isn’t necessarily reliable. 

You might be surprised to hear that much of the history you learned in school isn’t accurate. That’s because there isn’t a single, objective interpretation of past events – historical accounts often deviate from one another because of who was writing them. For example, when the author was in school, he learned that gracious European settlers had allowed Native Americans to live on reservations for free since the Native Americans were too primitive to understand the concept of private property.

As a trained hypnotist, Adams knows a thing or two about influencing the human brain. Hypnotists take their patients through a step-by-step process that begins with small suggestions like, “Your eyelids are getting heavier.” These prepare the brain for more significant suggestions, like those that help overcome a phobia. 

But you don’t have to believe in hypnosis for a similar method to be useful in combating procrastination. When you’re considering a big life change like applying to grad school, changing your job, or moving to a new city, it’s easy to get overwhelmed by the size of the project as a whole. But psyching yourself out like this is another kind of loserthink. To avoid it, try thinking about productivity in terms of microsteps.

Have you ever said something that someone else misinterpreted? As a public figure with a large following on Twitter, Adams experiences this on a daily basis. Among other things, he’s been called a racist, a liar, and a neo-Nazi supporter. He’s also been criticized for his ardent support of President Trump.

But before you blame this on social media, consider his point of view on the press, too – as a person who’s experienced fame, he says he’s well-acquainted with the fourth estate’s tendency to misinterpret the truth most of the time. He says that less than ten percent of his critics, both professional and otherwise, accurately interpret his personal thoughts or opinions. That’s because, while many people believe they’re good at guessing others’ thoughts, no one is capable of mind reading.

If you’re like most people, never-ending gloom-and-doom predictions about the future have left you, at the very least, concerned. Between climate change, unemployment, and the healthcare crisis, our current media climate has created a constant state of anxiety.

However, the author believes that things are often better than news outlets would like us to think. Take unemployment. Though many futurists have speculated that robots will increasingly displace low-skilled workers, new economic and technological developments suggest that we might be approaching the end of unemployment.