I wrote my sample column for The Michigan Daily Opinion section the night before the application was due. This wasn’t for a lack of trying to write it the entire week before. In reality, I was having a hard time because I thought that every word I wrote had to be ground-breaking information no one had ever heard before. After hours of writing, rewriting and convincing myself I was, for a lack of better words, opinionless, I officially gave up. I rewarded my failure with an episode of “Sex and the City.”
Halfway through, I realized I was talking to the TV, giving my opinions based on what I had learned during my first year of college. I grabbed my computer and started writing the most taboo, controversial things I have ever written. By the time I was done cutting out all unnecessary examples and descriptors, it wasn’t half bad. In lowering the risk of needing to curate an original thought, I reaped higher rewards than ever before: writing as an Opinion columnist. That is, the low-risk, high-reward mentality allows for a more stable approach to personal and academic success.
“High-risk, high-reward” is a term generally used in the realm of business, referring to investments that have the potential to receive a higher return rate if you put your money at a higher risk. But when we look beyond the scope of the office, we can see how this mindset influences our generation’s everyday habits.
The all-or-nothing approach is often romanticized in a more glamorous way than it deserves, not taking into account the realistic implications and possible downsides. When we hear people say, “go big or go home,” we normalize the idea that in order to achieve great success, we must first embrace a significant risk. This logic can be damaging, as it overlooks the value of examining thoughtful approaches and potential outcomes.
A common feeling among students, especially when it comes to extracurriculars and social lives, is the overwhelming urge to think we are not doing enough, even if we are doing everything at once. It is crucial to remember that when we join clubs or attend events, not every interaction, personal or professional, has to be viewed as a networking opportunity. This is not to say that casual social interactions shouldn’t allow for opportunities for professional growth; rather, it is important to recognize the benefits of taking pressure off-campus engagement. Putting yourself out there in any social context without the stress of building lifelong relationships or professional contacts will ultimately allow for a higher reward. As a result, you have the chance to meet a diverse group of people, form unexpected bonds and open doors for future opportunities, big and small, that you would’ve otherwise missed out on.
From an academic standpoint, it is important for students to understand that not all things have to call for such high stakes. At any stage of their academic career, students place extreme pressures on themselves to submit revolutionary work and interact in the classroom in a way that impresses others, so much so that it hinders the creative process. By embracing the low-risk, high-reward mentality, students are able to better engage in discussions, even without fully developed ideas, allowing for growth rather than a setback. This might mean valuing the process of learning over the outcome, and moving beyond the tangible success of receiving a good grade.
This perspective also reaches beyond academia and allows for small, everyday changes to make significant differences in our lives. “Low-risk,” in this case, means making incremental changes when completing certain day-to-day tasks, something that has been proven to yield substantial changes over time. Gradually compiling habits and investing in yourself at close to no cost reinforces motivation and allows you to reap the higher reward of a healthier lifestyle.
Although it may be easy to confuse “low-risk” with laziness, that is not the point. At its core, this mentality rejects traditional approaches to academic and lifestyle choices, offering new ways of achieving success without conforming to outdated ideologies of great reward solely coming from great risk. This mindset does not equate to a lack of effort or dedication. Rather, it depicts how strategically allocating resources such as time, money and energy allows for greater productivity and growth. This ultimately promotes innovation and creativity, allowing for more consistent and sustainable ways of practice.
By altering the mindset that high-risk automatically equates to high-reward, we are able to open up our everyday lives to a flood of new small opportunities that gradually transform to bigger ones. Even if you do continue the high-risk, high-reward approach, it is important to take a minute to think about alternative ways of achieving a similar goal that may not require so much sacrifice.
Even though I wracked my brain all week trying to think of new innovative ways of convincing my readers that lowering their risks will reap a higher reward, I still waited until the night before this column was due, gave up and then took my own advice and got back to writing. If you read this far, you know how that story ended.
Angelina Akouri is an Opinion Columnist studying English and Political Science. She writes about the influence of pop culture on students. She can be reached at akouria@umich.edu.