Illusion of Control

Discussed on The Economist’s “The Intelligence” podcast: the plight of the modern casino, how millenials just don’t dig the slot machines like the previous generations (revenue from slot machines is, according to the reporter, 2/3 of any given casino’s income) and the casinos’ efforts to appeal to the latest generation by incorporating elements of video games – skill, etc – into slot machines and thus, in theory, stave off a financial apocalypse.

Among the problems to this approach to apocalypse-staving, they’re exacerbating the problem of the Illusion of Control (defined in the Oxford Dictionary of Psychology as “the belief that one has control over events that are actually determined by chance”) in the players  – and, I would add, in themselves.

Laterally: how do I allow my own Illusion of Control to pervade The Work? Is it in a mad faith that somewhere, somehow, if I just pull the lever one more time, that I’ll drudge up the ability, the skill – no matter how fleeting – to wrangle those words into something possessed of meaning and of creative satisfaction, a next paragraph, a mad faith that will pay off one day, just one day, just give it one more go?

Perhaps. But all I can do is the same thing I do every day: show up and give it, The Work, my time and what passes for my brainpower. Beyond that, perhaps an acceptance of my lack of control over everything else in this game of chance is in order.