A belief is only really worthwhile if you could, in principle, be persuaded to believe otherwise.

Long term readers of this blog may have noticed that I often contradict myself. For example in one post I may suggest that reading a lot is a good idea, then all of a sudden I may change my mind and recommend to do more and read less. At first, this behavior may look suspicious, but I believe it’s necessary. Here’s why:

  1. I don’t like to take sides. My ideas are worth no more than those of others, and most importantly, I may be wrong. With that in mind whenever I find new evidence that what I’m doing is sub optimal, it’s easier for me to change my mind. If I’d take strict sides on all of my ideas then nobody could convince me of the opposite, no matter how much evidence they show.
  2. Most of my beliefs (at least the ones I write about) come from personal experience. They’re not applicable to everyone in every situation, they’re just what worked for me in that particular situation. The fact that some of them turn out to work for others is just an added bonus. That said, it’s rare that what worked for me in the past will work for me in the present. With new tools and new knowledge comes new systems and new beliefs.

In short, I change my mind whenever I find new evidence that contradicts my original ideas. I don’t mind if I receive critics whenever I do so, inside of me I congratulate myself for being rational and not being stuck on a false belief. I prefer to say the truth, even if that means contradicting everything I said until now.