Is There Something in the Way We Perceive the World?

i was more intrigued by, and i've told the story a million times, the guy sitting on my right is having a great month this month. And then next month they switched. The take away has been, am therea to be something in the way we perceive the world around us that is driving this? And i don't know what that is, and i need to find out. Two books kind of led me down that path: jack schwager's market wizards; thomas gillovitchas he's a professor cornell, how we know what isn't.