The Serenity Prayer Function
A piecewise function modeled on the Serenity Prayer, with a self-referential twist: its second branch applies only outside its own domain.
Use this cartoon
Free for classrooms, worksheets, slides and other non-commercial use under CC BY-NC 4.0, with credit to Ben Orlin.
Cartoon by Ben Orlin, Math with Bad Drawings. https://cartoons.mathwithbaddrawings.com/2025-06-23-the-serenity-prayer-function/ (CC BY-NC 4.0)Transcript
[Title] "The Serenity Prayer Function" f(x) = { x, x ∈ domain(f) ["accepts what it cannot change"]; x + 1, x ∉ domain(f) ["changes what it cannot accept"] }