Do you ever think about trade-offs in your life? Something as simple as choosing to have the Doritos knowing they are bad for your body? Or driving over the speed limit knowing you could get a ticket. Or blowing your money on daily lattes knowing one day you may regret not saving more.
Trade-offs are a natural part of existence. I learned about them in an ecological or evolutionary sense. Natural selection favors some characteristics in some environments, but not other. Darwin’s finches beak size changed to reduce competition, but smaller beaks could no longer eat larger seeds. The trade-off there is that you gain an advantage (lower competition for smaller seeds) but you lose the ability to eat the common resource (medium or large seeds). You trade being a generalist for being a specialist.
Life is full of these trade-offs. You can’t be at two places at once. We make choices every day to do one thing instead of another. Sure, you can spend more time at work and increase your chances for a promotion, but you will sacrifice that time with your family and you might not get home until after your kids are asleep.
Trade-offs.
If we can’t have it all, we are always choosing one thing over another. And the key is to accept that and move forward.
Regret is a terrible monster. We can choose to believe we make good choices, or we can regret the choices we didn’t make. As part of making trade-offs we have to accept this or suffer the (rumination and anxiety) consequences.
In this episode I analyze trade-offs. What they mean in our lives and how we can deal with them without stress and anxiety.
All KEW Episodes are available in podcast audio and YouTube video formats. You can subscribe to the Knowledge + Experience = Wisdom on your favorite podcast app or on YouTube.
Direct podcast download Episode 89: https://pdcn.co/e/https://chtbl.com/track/CGDA9D/www.buzzsprout.com/530563/10267338-no-free-lunch-kew-episode-89-trade-offs.mp3?download=true
Direct link to YouTube Episode 89: https://youtu.be/SHKYmaWq1bU