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I think you're ignoring the GP's last paragraph.

Maybe an intermediate position is to say, "Before you attempt to beat the odds, make sure you can survive the odds beating you." Because the odds are, they will.

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This is more of a question of personal philosophy/mindset, not logic. When you set yourself (or someone else) up for failure you've already failed and at that point there's nothing one can do. If you don't believe you can do something you won't do it. It's a loser's mindset. At the bare minimum you have to believe in yourself to be able to do things, no one else is going to do them for you.

Right, and if someone doesn't have the loser's mindset then reading "it's hard to beat the odds, don't try" wont deter them. So there's no loss there. It might deter someone with the loser's mindset though, and given that they weren't going to make it anyway if you knock them off track early then that's a benefit.

Yeah. "My" Aaron, the last time we were in touch, was going in and out of Ukraine, transporting supplies between Russian bombardments.

People deterred by someone else's words usually internally hesitated anyway.

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