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Luck and risk are both the reality that every outcome in life is guided by forces other than individual effort.

There is no reason to risk what you have and need for what you don’t have and don’t need.

Denial is simultaneously the safe and the wrong way to handle a problem. Suggesting the right and the risky way will get you into trouble.

…the evaluation of the risk depends on the choice of a measure – with the obvious possibility that the choice may have been guided by a preference for one outcome or another.

…[there is] a basic limitation in the ability of our mind to deal with small risks: we either ignore them altogether or give them far too much weight – nothing in between.

When forecasting the outcomes of risky projects, executives too easily fall victim to the planning fallacy. In its grip, they make decisions based on delusional optimism rather than a rational weighting of gains, losses, and probabilities.

…people often (but not always) take on risky projects because they are overly optimistic about the odds they face.

Because optimistic bias can be both a blessing and a risk, you should be both happy and wary if you are temperamentally optimistic.

…evidence suggests that an optimistic bias plays a role – sometimes the dominant role – whenever individuals or institutions voluntarily take on significant risks.

…there are periods in which competition, among experts and among organizations, creates powerful forces that favor a collective blindness to risk and uncertainty.