July 25, 2026 — You can be right about every detail and still be wrong.
There is always a bigger context with unconsidered things, one (or more) of which, if considered, would reveal your ideas to be wrong or irrelevant.
The true dominant term in all equations is always unknown.
There is always a much easier way to do something that you are not seeing.
If you can't spot a better strategy later, you're bad at hindsight analysis, not great at strategy.
Don't beat yourself up when wrong - you were probably right about some things. Acknowledge the details you got right, acknowledge the upstream thing you got wrong, and move forward.
Whenever you are confident in a position, always end with "but I could be wrong, perhaps ____". Sometimes all of that work to build out the detailed idea was just a way to find the upstream ideas.
But even if the detailed idea is the correct idea, upstream humility never hurts.
How do you get better at finding the upstream things?
Sometimes you can find the upstream things with words, sometimes without. Learn how to learn with words, learn how to learn without words.
Always be open to new ideas.
The converse of this is true as well.
You can be wrong about every detail and still be right.
Oftentimes we call this person "lucky". And sometimes that's true, but perhaps they are just playing a higher level game.