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timtyler comments on I'm scared. - Less Wrong Discussion
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No, that is exactly wrong. The whole problem is that no course of action guarantees success. The world is throwing curveballs.
My own solution is to shift my terminal values to the meta level. Instead of demanding success of myself (and then feeling bad if success turns out to be unattainable) I reward myself with a gold star if I judge that I have done my best. I live my life so as to have no regrets.
The difficulty (you might call it a trap) in this approach is in the need to retain a brutal honesty. It may be very tempting to respond to failures by giving yourself the star anyways, with the excuse "How could I have known?". How could I have known that wouldn't work? How could I have known that is not what they wanted? How could I have known that my 'friend' was a con artist? There may well have been a way you could have known - clues that you missed.
It can be tricky finding the middle road of learning from your mistakes, without falling into the error of denying mistakes or obsessing over them.
Maybe you will like this one:
No Regrets, or: Edith Piaf Revamps Decision Theory - Frank Arntzenius
Yes, indeed. I like it very much. Thank you. Though the recommendation might be more useful to people if it had appeared in a decision-theory (Newcomb, expected utility maximization, etc.) thread, rather than here in a practical rationality thread.
Yay - hookup points!
I have mentioned that paper previously here - on the Ingredients of Timeless Decision Theory thread.