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Hyperbolic Discounting: Why You Make Terrible Life Choices

Hyperbolic Discounting: Why You Make Terrible Life Choices

Nir’s Note: This guest post is written and illustrated by Lakshmi Mani, a product designer working in San Francisco. Discover other reasons you make terrible life choices like confirmation bias, distinction bias, extrinsic motivation, fundamental attribution error, hindsight bias, and peak end rule.

Have you ever had a mounting pile of work you know you need to do but for some reason didn’t? There’s an important deadline looming, your boss is breathing down your neck, the pressure is on — all signs are pointing to you getting it done. Yet you put it off, turn on Netflix, and fantasize about how you’re going to crush it tomorrow.

You’ve fallen victim to hyperbolic discounting.

hyperbolic discounting
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Happiness Hack: This One Ritual Made Me Much Happier

When my wife and I moved to New York City in 2001, recently graduated from college and newly wed, we were eager to find friends. We knew nearly no one but were sure we’d soon find a fun-loving group like the 20- and 30-something New Yorkers who spontaneously dropped in on one another on TV shows like Seinfeld and Friends.

We hatched a plan. After moving into our Midtown Manhattan apartment, we invited all the neighbors over for drinks by placing Kinko’s-printed quarter-sheets into everyone’s mailboxes. Then, we waited for our versions of Chandler, Kramer, and Elaine to show up. But they didn’t. In fact, no one did. As the ice in the cooler melted and the guacamole browned, not a single person among 100 apartments stopped by. Not. One. Person.

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