The following clip of Tim Ferriss talking about defining fears seems very deep to me.  There’s a clear analogy here with the Samurai approach of visualising death in order to overcome their fear of it. Not to mention the falsification process that strong chess player’s go through.

Of course pessimism tends to be looked down upon in our culture of upbeat optimism in which books such as The Secret (imagining cheques coming one’s way etc) become best sellers. So anyone for a bit of Seneca or maybe the Hagakure? Failing that, here’s the trailer from Ghost Dog.