A Five-Part Series on Decisions, Beliefs and the Architecture of Revenge There is a dangerous assumption we sometimes make about emotional intelligence. We imagine that because someone can control their emotions, they must therefore be making good decisions. Joseph had become extraordinarily good at control. He could notice anger. Delay reaction. Study people. Understand beliefs. Observe ego. Predict behavior. Create conditions. Wait. His father had reacted in seconds, destroying his life. Joseph had spent years ensuring he would never make the same mistake. But perhaps there was another question. What if delaying a destructive decision does not necessarily make the decision less destructive? Michael and his brother had already lost almost everything. The paint company was gone. Their local properties had been swallowed by debt. The social circles that once welcomed them became less welcoming. Money has an interesting relationship with friendship. It is sometimes only when the money di...
A Five-Part Series on Decisions, Beliefs and the Architecture of Revenge By the sixth year, Joseph was living two completely different lives. By day, he was still the hardworking young man helping Michael expand the paint business. By night, he was finishing the project he had worked on for years. Eventually, he secured enough funding to test his system in China. It worked. He asked for two weeks’ leave to visit relatives in the village, but instead he flew to Shenzhen for the first trial. He completed the patenting process soon after. Then he pitched it to a multinational company that had been looking for almost exactly that solution. From presentation to closing, the entire process took less than six months. They offered to buy the patent for twenty million dollars, but Joseph refused. Instead, he granted them an exclusive license for certain markets. In the first year, the arrangement earned him about $500,000. The following year it brought in around $2 million. Joseph now knew with...