It is not the product of wisdom when we tell ourselves something will not work, try the thing having decided it won’t work, conclude that it doesn’t work, and walk away telling ourselves or others with a puffed chest: “I knew it!” or “I told you so!”
It is directing oneself, or worse — others, towards a predetermined and in most cases ill-fated conclusion.
To paint a rather maddening yet all-too-appropriate visual analogy: it’s as if you are trying to a wrestle a door open on one side only to have it be you on the other side pulling with equal and opposite force.
This is the precise posture we find ourselves in anytime we conclude before any earnest attempt, “this won’t work. It’s not possible.”
The only way to potentiate a different outcome is to decide that it’s possible.
