Are you maximizing your upside or minimizing your downside?

She was a young girl, maybe 7 or 8 years old.

Hello guys,

Hope you are doing well. I’m okay, Alhamdulillah.

I am a little low on motivation today. And it’s not even about this newsletter, it’s about everything. WhatsApp messages I need to reply? Meh. Emails? Meh. Start working on my report due Tuesday? Meh. The four phone calls I previously scheduled for today? Meh. Hahaha okay, I’m looking forward to one or two of those.

But yeah.

So what should I be doing instead?

I entered the Al Pacino rabbit hole last week and still have a lot of content left to consume. I’m also two-thirds into reading Jennifer Brown’s All The Bright Places, even though I’ve looked up the ending already. Let’s see how that goes.

Anyhoo, there are two things I’m thinking about today.

Mr. tennis and his daughter

On Friday morning, I took a small break from my computer and went to the balcony to stretch. Down below, I could see a father and daughter playing a game of tennis. Don’t ask me how I knew they were father and daughter, I just know. 😂

It piqued my interest so I stayed there a few minutes watching them. She was a young girl, maybe 7 or 8 years old. The father, maybe late thirties.

Not real picture - image from Tennis World USA

This could not have been the girl’s first game, because she didn’t totally suck. She must have definitely practiced a few times before. But on the other hand, she wasn’t really good. She played the ball right into the net many times and played it well outside the court limits many more times.

What stood out to me was how patient the father was. If his aim on that (workday) morning was to enjoy a quick nice game of tennis, then he definitely would have been disappointed. What it was instead was a slow game of watching your kid make mistakes.

More importantly, he showed no signs whatsoever of frustration. Not once did he say ‘turn your bat the other way!’ or ‘try and hit harder!’ as he watched her fumble.

I realized it was not a game of a father teaching his daughter tennis. It was a father allowing his daughter to figure out how to play tennis in his presence.

Also, he gave her no reason to feel stressed. In another scenario, the kid might have had to go get the ball every 20 seconds she played it outside. This would have reduced the quality of the girl’s playing experience as she would have been spending equal amounts of time playing and ball fetching!

But he didn’t seem to care where the balls went. He had a bag with like 20 balls inside, and every time one disappeared, he got out another one and continued. Then they took a break at intervals to gather the balls and continue.

I do not know this man or whether I would see him again. But I learnt a lot from their interaction. And then it made me think about just how much our parents have done for us. It’s very easy to forget when living with parents at this stage, especially as we appear to be the ones doing all the chores and numerous errands.

But if we were to somehow access video footage of the past, all of us without exception would identify something similar to this man and his child.

Maybe when we were struggling to walk. Maybe when we could not pronounce some words properly. Maybe it was them dealing with years of pooing and bedwetting. Maybe when we mixed up right and left shoes as children. Maybe maybe maybe.

No gratitude we show now would ever be enough repayment. But we need to try anyway.

رَّبِّ ارۡحَمۡهُمَا كَمَا رَبَّيٰنِىۡ صَغِيۡرًا

“My Lord, have mercy upon them as they brought me up [when I was] small.” - 17:24

The upside vs downside trade-off

On a phone call with my sister a few weeks ago, our discussion came to a conclusion which forms today’s hypotheis.

Every decision you take is either a function of maximizing your upside or minimizing your downside.

Let's think about it in terms of football.

Every decision is either offensive or defensive. If Sir Alex subbed Carrick for Chicharito in a 2013 United game, that would have been an offensive move. The team needed to score.

But it’s not just about subs.

A ‘through pass’ is an offensive pass, an X pass is a defensive pass. In stoppage time, a team might decide to take things slow and pass the ball around (defensive) or the entire 11 players might go into the opposition’s half as they look for a winning goal.

Still with me?

Okay.

Now, outside of football. The choice of schools you go to, careers you choose, places you settle down, people you commit to, etc are all either an offensive or a defensive move.

In career choice, you could either decide to reach for the stars and bet on entrepreneurship (maximizing your upside) or focus on a predictable job and steady employment (minimizing your downside).

Because very few employees will become billionaires. But on the other hand, very few entrepreneurs have the luxury of health insurance, having rent money saved up, and can make long-term financial commitments to their children’s education.

There’s always a trade-off.

Taking a loan to school at Harvard or Oxford is an offensive move because you would be able to access people and opportunities you could never have imagined otherwise. But you now have student debt. Someone else might choose to minimize their downside, staying in their job in Akure where they can easily pay their household bills with zero debt to their name.

And the same thing applies to relationships.

Maximizing your upside involves being specific about what you want, never settling and shooting for the stars in the hope for a perfect fit. Minimizing your downside is the exact opposite - nobody is perfect so if someone ticks the most important boxes 1, 2, and 3, let’s commit and see how it goes.

Families who think about minimizing downside are often the ones to say, ‘Iseyin must marry Iseyin’ or ‘Sagamu must marry Sagamu’. Even though they may know very little about the individual suitor’s actual traits, a belief that all Iseyin people have some positive shared values quickly puts their mind at ease.

My newsletter is never complete if I haven’t mentioned Canada. 😂 😂

If you engage with the majority of people who (have the skills and means to) relocate for the PR, they are probably doing quite well in Nigeria. Bank Managers, Oil & Gas Engineers, Accountants in the Big 4, IT Professionals, etc.

One might argue, ‘You have an amazing career at home. You make good money and are well respected. At this rate, you'll get to the top very soon. Why leave it all to begin from scratch in a country where you know nobody and your previous experience carries no weight?’

It turns out they are minimizing their downside.

They may have lower status jobs in the short-term, but they now have universal healthcare and are no longer in the ‘one illness away from poverty’ group. Their kids will go to great schools. No need for lesson teachers.

A corner office might now be elusive, but they no longer spend 3 hours on 3rd Mainland traffic. They may no longer have drivers or housegirls or gatemen greeting them ‘Morning sir’, but they now have much better personal security and much more personal time.

The point of this is not to advocate for either maximizing your upside or minimizing your downside. I suspect that different people in different situations will come to a different decision.

The decision that is best for them.

As you begin a new week, I hope you remember to be grateful for the mercy of your parents. And with every decision you take, ask yourself one question.

Is this an offensive or a defensive move?

—————

Breaking regular format to remind you to subscribe x share.

Gracias, and see you around.

Hameed

** Jara content:

“Do not worry about Singapore. My colleagues and I are sane, rational people even in our moments of anguish. We weigh all possible consequences before we make any move on the political chessboard. Our people have the will to fight and the stuff that makes for survival.”

- Lee Kuan Yew, From Third World to First: The Singapore Story

Have a great week. 💫