Influence and Facts
by Miki Saxon
How often are your actions influenced by what someone else says they heard?
I think most of us have a tendency to accept that kind of commentary, especially when other outcomes are unlikely.
The recent experience of Anthony Perosi is a shinning example of just how costly relying on second-hand information can be.
Like millions of others, Perosi plays the NY Lottery.
A few days after the Powerball drawing on March 14, Mr. Perosi, 56, was eating lunch at a restaurant, where someone told him that the 7-Eleven on Page Avenue had sold a Powerball winner.
“I says, ‘I’ve played at Page Avenue 7-Eleven,’ ” Mr. Perosi recalled on Thursday.
“She was like, ‘Forget about it.’ ” She heard a schoolteacher had won. She told Mr. Perosi, “You didn’t win nothing.”
So rather than checking himself he accepted what Sandy had heard as fact.
But his truck breaking down in April gave Perosi the impetus to check himself.
To his total astonishment the winning numbers were his.
His and the IRS, to the tune of 136 million dollars
The lesson here is that the next time you start to accept what someone states as fact, it pays to check for yourself.
Sometimes it pays very well indeed.
Flickr image credit: Mark Morgan
