Have you ever felt obligated to finish reading a book even though it felt like a chore? Maybe you started a movie that piqued your interest, but the first few frames didn’t look promising. Have you already said one hateful comment to a friend in a heated moment? Well, why not say a couple more?

What does this mental framework actually mean, and how does it work? It’s called the sunk cost fallacy — the notion of continuing to do something for the simple reason that you have already started. It’s one of those illogical defense mechanisms the human brain seems to utilize in order to justify behavior despite it being incredibly self-destructive.

Several theories have been proposed for why so many people fall into this logical trap. One is loss aversion — meaning that people tend to overvalue the impact that losses have on our mental state as opposed to undervaluing a possible gain. Another idea is commitment bias, meaning people tend to illogically associate the process of merely starting something with productivity and efficiency.

I would like to share some of the most poignant examples in my own life in which the sunk cost fallacy has caused me far more harm than good.

First, I forced myself to stay in a very dreadful class simply because I put the work into registering for it. The sunk cost was sordidly infecting my mind like a parasite — I figured, “I already put the time into picking this class for the requirements I needed, so it would not make any sense to go through this process again. It would be a waste of time.”

That “waste of time” comment couldn’t be more ironic. If I had spent the extra hour setting up a replacement class, I would have saved about 50 hours of work and lectures that were of very little value to me. By my math, I believe that’s a net gain of about 48 hours of time I could have spent learning, instead of the excruciating evil that lay in that economics class.

Alright, so that was 48 hours lost to sunk cost, but let’s go deeper. I spent a lot of my youth and adolescence believing in the negative stigma surrounding being “nerdy” or ashamed of one’s intellectual prowess, with the miscalculated mantra of “only isolated nerds do that.”

Years of my teens were spent lamenting in my sorrow and self-consciousness. Things I would have loved to engage with more frequently — the chess club, talking to interesting individuals and even merely reading in public — I avoided entirely out of this detrimental judgement of how I would be perceived.

Anyways, times got particularly tough for me later on in high school, for I found that I was limiting a core part of my soul that wanted to be shared with the world. In the cafeteria at lunchtime, I would avoid conversations that would strike me as “intellectual” at all costs, and I even restricted myself from going to enriching events like a chess tournament, all out of my belief system. Despite intensely wanting to change, I thought that I would be “betraying” my rigid value of labeling all intellectuals as outcasts if I suddenly decided to try it wholeheartedly for myself.

What I viewed in my adolescence as being odd behavior, I now see, actually enhances every waking moment for me threefold. I am proud to say that I embrace the label of being a deep thinker, and everything that comes with it.

I am a student of philosophy, a student of history and most definitely a lover of all books. When I am reading on a bus or in a public park, I poke out the title for the world to see. I think intellectuals are the coolest people on the planet, and we need only look at any historical event to see they are the ones who have left the biggest imprints on humankind. However, it was the sunk cost fallacy that was preventing me from seeing objectively.

For one last example, I want to talk about a crucial point in my life when I overcame the sunk cost fallacy.

I spent most of the waking hours in my adolescent years as many boys do — elated eyes glued to a screen, sweaty hands gripped to a controller as I played the latest video game that’s in fashion. Nothing inherently insidious about video games, in my opinion, but my obsession started to take over my life. I sat for most of my waking hours, hardly got outside and often skipped meals.

However, I had a change of heart during the summer when I was 16 years old. I had an unwavering commitment to disciplining my body, in addition to my video game skills. Every day was a new and exciting challenge — learning a new movement in the gym, practicing and bettering myself. Like a video game, but all of the upgrades and stats are visible in this world.

What am I trying to say? Well, there were often times during that summer when I was first trying to get into shape when the sunk cost would existentially question me. An internal voice would often ask me, “You’ve already wasted so much time being inactive, why try now?”

Over time, I began to take the reins over the thoughts, and encouragement ensued. Each time the thought came into my mind, I used it as further motivation to push harder and with greater intention. I am proud to say that now, four years later, disciplining the body has become a crucial value for me.

It’s easy to point out when a character in a book or a person you know may be falling for the temptations of sunk cost fallacy, but it’s often hard to catch ourselves doing so. Being aware of the sunk cost fallacy within the mental discourse we are having with ourselves can go a long way.

Don’t succumb to sunk cost — it’s a fallacy for a reason!

Jacob Lieser is a junior majoring in philosophy, politics and law.

Views expressed in the opinions pages represent the opinions of the columnists. The only piece that represents the view of the Pipe Dream Editorial Board is the staff editorial.