We enjoy learning, yes, but a lot of opportunities to learn “procedural” skills are quite risky. Starting a company has big financial risks, reading about starting a company doesn’t. Video games are mostly about procedural skills, but aren’t risky, so they’re very attractive too.
A way to counter this would be to recognize that quite a few of those risks are overblown. The risk of quitting your job to start a company is real, how about the fear that girls will reject you if you approach them, or that people will laugh at you if you don’t speak their language correctly ? Are those really such a big deal ?
Good point about risk, definitely something to think about. And thanks for mentioning the “language barrier”—it’s a very good example. I’ve broken it twice—with English and Italian—and both times weren’t too easy, and with French I haven’t broken it yet, even though I can parse French written text easier than Italian. (My native language is Russian.)
An overlooked factor here is risk.
We enjoy learning, yes, but a lot of opportunities to learn “procedural” skills are quite risky. Starting a company has big financial risks, reading about starting a company doesn’t. Video games are mostly about procedural skills, but aren’t risky, so they’re very attractive too.
A way to counter this would be to recognize that quite a few of those risks are overblown. The risk of quitting your job to start a company is real, how about the fear that girls will reject you if you approach them, or that people will laugh at you if you don’t speak their language correctly ? Are those really such a big deal ?
Good point about risk, definitely something to think about. And thanks for mentioning the “language barrier”—it’s a very good example. I’ve broken it twice—with English and Italian—and both times weren’t too easy, and with French I haven’t broken it yet, even though I can parse French written text easier than Italian. (My native language is Russian.)