Understanding Overlaps

We like clean categories. Us vs. them. Good vs. bad. Winners and losers.

But the world doesn’t work that way. Most of life exists in overlapping distributions.

Not all rich people are smart, and not all poor people are lazy. Not all great leaders are extroverts, and not all quiet people lack vision. Even in politics, the most vocal extremists drown out the vast middle, where views blur and blend.

When we ignore these overlaps, we make bad decisions. We design policies for the “average” person, missing the messy reality of individual experiences. We assume someone is either “in” or “out” of a group, failing to see the gray in between. We create divisions where none need to exist.

The fix? Learn to see the spectrum. Resist the urge to ignore complexity into simple boxes. Because when we acknowledge the overlap, we make better choices, build better teams, and find common ground where we once saw only walls.

So many of societies problems are caused by an unwillingness or an inability to imagine overlapping distributions