Quit: The Power of Knowing When to Walk Away

That’s the way that we need to think too. When we find something that’s working for us, whether it’s a job, a career, a product that we’re developing, a business strategy, or even a favorite restaurant that we love going to, continuing to explore what other options might be available is a good strategy in a world as uncertain as the one that we liv

If you are going to gaff the scale against quitting by adding endowment into the mix, at least make the thing you’ve become endowed to something that represents real progress at solving a hard problem.

One of the goals for all of us should be to, as much as possible, maximize the diversification of interests, skills, and opportunities in each of our portfolios.

“The results of this paper suggest that people may be excessively cautious when facing life-changing choices.” The corollary of this is also true. When people quit on time, it will usually feel like they are quitting too early, because it will be long before they experience the choice as a close call.

As we carry around beliefs and ideas, they become our possessions. We own what we’ve bought and what we’ve thought.

Be picky about what you stick to. Persevere in the things that matter, that bring you happiness, and that move you toward your goals. Quit everything else, to free up those resources so you can pursue your goals and stop sticking to things that slow you down.

the world is stochastic. That’s just a fancy way of saying that luck makes it difficult to predict exactly how things will turn out, at least not in the short run. We operate not with certainties but with probabilities,

within a year, she had put together a cross-agency group of behavioral scientists, policy experts, and program makers, founding and chairing the White House’s first-ever Social and Behavioral Sciences Team. When Obama left office in January 2017, Shankar also departed, moving on to become Google’s global director of behavioral science. In 2021, she

Being forced to quit forces you to start exploring new options and opportunities. But you should start exploring before you’re forced to. Even after you have found a path that you want to stick to, keep doing some exploration. Things change, and whatever you are doing now may not be the best path for you to pursue in the future. Having more options