The MMM community and blog mean a variety of different things to each of us and sometimes different things to any one of us at different times in our lives. I certainly arrived via the financial independence focus, while also mildly intrigued by the older posts about how to weld deck railings. Eventually, I became equally, if not more, interested in the environmental and philosophical parts of the writing. The posts on Stoicism and optimism, in particular, drew me in, as did the critiques of modern news media and where they attempt to focus our attention.
Recently, in considering this, I've thought of MMM as fairly pragmatic in his optimism. He isn't saying there aren't things to worry about, just that society worries about the wrong things, and overlooks important things. I think this argument is pretty well developed in his writing, so I don't feel a need to rehash it here, but if I'm wrong, please let me know.
So, my questions are: What are the real risks in life, the ones that are important either because 1) the probability of occurrence isn't vanishingly small or 2) the consequences are somewhere between important and dire, AND because you can actually take practical steps that will impact the probability or the consequence? And, for those risks, what can you do to mitigate them? I'm not really talking about investing risk here. At times, I feel like investing risk is a distraction from other bigger picture things you can overlook, assuming you have enough baseline mustachianism up and running that you're not taking on debt, overspending, etc. Let's assume that's "dealt with" for the most part.
This is intended to be a practical exercise. I'm listing some of the big ones I've been able to identify below, but really I'm hoping to crowdsource ideas for things I could and should be doing as non-silly risk management steps. I'm keeping my list to 5 to try to focus my attention. I'm by no means convinced that these are my TOP 5, they feel like more of a random sample...
1. Long term physical health - probability: moderate to high, impact: moderate to high. - Management: exercise and diet are the big ones. This is a toughie because it requires steady, long term management, e.g. consistent exercise
2. Estate planning issues - probability: Zero or near certain, impact: zero to high. Management: get a will in place, sign it, communicate with the executor, etc. This is an example of a risk that can be relatively simple to manage, but people might overlook it. My wife and I became parents in 2009, but we didn't get our act together to get a signed will until 2018. I feel like this risk is now meaningfully managed, but what the heck took me this long?
3. Family memories and digital protections: Probability: low, impact: high. Management: Following best practices on password protections, backing up photos and saving in multiple physical locations. This might seem like an odd one to include, but I had a friend who lost all her family photos in a fire and I've always remembered the story. Similarly, stories about identity theft seem to illustrate that this has a small chance of happening, but can be devastating in its effects. I plan to spend some time in the next couple weeks figuring out if I've actually been doing the equivalent of driving with my digital seat belt off, or if this is something I don't need to worry about so much.
4. Mental/Emotional health (social isolation, meaning creation) - Probability: moderate to high, impact: moderate to high. Management: Prioritize time with my family. Invest in friendships I already have. Enjoy my dog. Look for impactful activities beyond my self and my immediate home. Read. Participate in the arts. I think the default settings of modern U.S. life can be pretty awful on this dimension (partly because so many valuable activities in this realm do not generate profits for anyone...) but some conscious attention can move the needle a great deal.
(And finally, back to the mundane...)
5. Driving accidents - Probability: low to moderate, impact: low to high. Management: Drive less. Don't drive while fatigued. Try to avoid driving when people are likely to be drunk. Teach your kids as best you can how to drive well and manage their own driving risk.
Two big risks that didn't make the list because I'm struggling to articulate meaningful, concrete steps to manage them at the individual level: these require larger-scale social and political change (which are, of course, made up of individual changes...): Climate change and Dementia
My question to the community then: What key risks have you identified as important that people tend to ignore, and what steps have you been able to take to manage them?