Could you jump off a ten meter diving platform? It doesn’t sound that bad, does it?
Evolution has, for good reasons, hard wired a healthy fear of heights into all of us. But some are more susceptible than others. Ten meters seems to be a kind of sweet spot which is trivially easy for some people and seriously challenging for others. Check out this fasinating footage from the New York Times of different peoples’ reactions to this challenge.
Two things that jumped out at me:
- Challenges are scarier in reality than in the abstract.
- The longer you deliberate, the less chance you’ll follow through.