Specialization and Generalization
If you want to be efficient and make a lot of money, get really good at one thing. Specialize. Become a star performer. Dominate a field.
If you want to be resilient and reduce your material needs, get pretty good at many things. Be a generalist. Stitch and weave multiple fields together.
The risk of being really good at one thing is that if the world changes and no one needs that one thing any more, you are useless and need to scramble to retrain.
The risk of being good at many things is that you're unlikely to make premium salary in a world that can hire a specialist for every job, so you're going to be a loser (in the Game of Money).
In most cases, efficiency and resiliency are inversely related. The more of one you have, the less of the other you get. It’s difficult or impossible to have both.
Suitability and Adaptability
Efficiency implies suitability. This means that the entity is finely adapted to the particular environment it finds itself in.
Resiliency implies adaptability. This means that the entity is able to change, improvise, hack, bodge, or otherwise figure out how to assure the flows it needs to survive in just about any environment.
Stability
In stable environments, efficient systems outperform resilient systems. Coming in first is all that matters.
In unstable environments, resilient systems continue to exist while efficient systems fail and cease to exist. Being alive to cross the finish line at all is all that matters.
Everyone makes a choice, consciously or unconsciously, to pursue an efficiency based strategy or a resilience based strategy. The choice reflects their views on the stability of the environment their future self is going to have to navigate. Our global systems are tuned for efficiency, not resilience. Our industrial civilization assumes its environment is stable.
I think the future will be unstable relative to the late 20th century/early 21st, so I choose to pursue resiliency. I accept that I'm leaving peak performance returns on the table in exchange for a greater ability to adapt to whatever circumstances may unfold.
Do you think the world is going to be largely stable or largely unstable over the remainder of your life?