Trade-offs

I found the following excerpt from Dan Ariely and Jeff Kreisler’s book Dollars and Sense pretty eye-opening:

“A few years ago, Dan and a research assistant went to a Toyota dealership and asked people what they would give up if they purchased a new car. Almost no one had an answer. None of the shoppers had spent any significant time considering that the thousands of dollars they were about to spend on a car could be spent on other things.”

A few people managed to be specific — referencing vacations or outings to nice restaurants that they would no longer be able to splurge on. But for the most part, to Ariely and Kreisler’s point, humans seem to be generally bad at measuring, evaluating, and accepting tradeoffs.

Whether you are aware of it or not, every decision to do something implies a decision to not do something.

Every commitment implies a sacrifice.

Time spent here means time you cannot spend there.

Any attempt to game this reality — to try to be everywhere, to do all things — results in some kind of overcommitment, significantly reduced performance, and dissatisfaction.

When you commit to anything, be clear about the tradeoffs.

Be clear about why what you’ve chosen to do is so important and what other things in life you will not be doing — or at least be spending less time doing — as a result.

Consider Cal Newport’s three simple rules on the matter of time and productivity: “Do fewer things. Do them better. Know why you’re doing them.”