Have you ever been misled into making a decision premised on a faulty idea of economy?
Maybe it was the 24-roll pack of paper towels you picked up even though they weren’t the brand you like, but you bought them anyway because they were on sale. If you were equally happy with the paper towels as with your usual brand, then you made the choice based on a good economic calculation. But if you found yourself regretting the purchase each time you mopped up a spill with a thin paper towel that didn’t really do the job, then it was false economy.
False because whatever you saved in money probably didn’t make up for the frustration you felt about the thin towels, perhaps some regret at your purchase, perhaps irritation at having to use up 24 rolls of an inferior product. Even at a purely monetary level, it might be false economy if you wind up using two or three times as many paper towels as you would with your preferred brand.
The same kind of thinking can lead us into agreeing to projects, committees, volunteer work, or social engagements that don’t serve our deepest selves.
It’s easy to get misled into thinking you have to accept every professional invitation that comes your way. For example, it’s easy to see that presenting a paper at a conference in your field could be professionally valuable, even enjoyable. But if the conference topic isn’t directly related to your current research, then you have to carefully consider whether the extra time and energy it would require to write a proposal and a paper would actually be worth it.
A volunteer commitment, committee appointment, or publication venue that doesn’t directly fit with your priorities, goals, and mission isn’t really valuable, even if it seems to be on the surface. And feeling frustrated or drained by a commitment that doesn’t suit you is much, much worse than using up those 24 rolls of lousy paper towels.