You’re probably thinking it’s not possible.

When Tim Ferris challenged a lecture hall of Princeton students to contact the highest profile person they can (George Bush, Bill Gates, etc.) and ask them a question, no one did anything. Even though the prize was a free round-trip ticket to the destination of their choosing.

When Seth Godin taught at NYU and made the final exam about attempting to sell a TIME subscription to a high profile person, with the alternative being an F grade, only 1/3rd of people even tried.

“Someone else probably has better connections.” “I’m a bit busy with upcoming assignments.” “I wouldn’t be able to figure this out anyways.”

But when Tim came back another year to give the same challenge, and mention that no one even tried and won the ticket, many students actually tried.

In fact one student was able to get in touch via e-mail with the CEO of Google (at the time Eric Schmidt). He had to go through multiple rejections from the Dean before getting his personal e-mail from the alumni list. And he simply asked him when he had been the happiest in his life. (His response was: “Tomorrow”).

I’m sure many of us would die to be able to connect with the CEO of Google. But we don’t give much thought to how we could actually do so.

Here’s a thought: even if the probability is low, the rewards are nearly unlimited (with little cost, if any). Your expected value is positive. So even logically, why don’t we give whatever we need to do a try. No matter what our mind says, it just might work.