The measurement of success through statistics can be a dangerous game as it can pull your focus in the wrong direction.

Making decisions purely for their monetary value, which is something I’ve done, can leave you frustrated, empty and worse off down the road. The first year after a person wins the lottery, for instance, is statistically the worst year of their life.

Why?

They spend most of it trying to fend off people who want a piece of their winnings.

The story of the Oakland A’s, as given by Michael Lewis in “Moneyball,” (later turned into a movie by Aaron Sorkin), focuses on how stats were used to build a winning team at the expense of ignoring three young superstar pitchers who carried the team that year.

All were important, but the story of the individual was focused purely on Billy Beane. If you focus too much on Beane’s obsession with stats (sabermetrics as it’s called), you miss the bigger picture of what actually happened.

On paper, young people applying for jobs today are remarkable. However, put them at the interview table and you begin to see how little they’ve been prepared to deal with interpersonal skills (“selling themselves.”) The stats you see and follow don’t tell the story that resonates with you in the end.

Before you make your next decision purely on statistics, make sure to track which ones actually matter.

Science is a numbers game.

Life is a little more complex.