#5 - Tại sao thấy sai mà vẫn cứ làm?

Often times, people try to hold onto loveless relationships that they know won’t work in the end. If love is not to blame, then what is? The tendency to hold onto a situation that you yourself loathe can be explained by a phenomenon called ‘loss aversion’. You want a relationship, but at the same time are afraid of losing freedom. You want to quit your current job and pursue your passion, but at the same time worry about losing a steady income. People also tend to think more of losses than they do of gains. That way, they fall for the sunk cost fallacy. or as the popular vietnamese saying goes "Once you threw the lance, you might as well follow through with it." You know your girlfriend is a gold digger; but thinking about the new iPhone 6s you just gifted her the other day, which you certainly cannot take back, as well as all the time and effort you’ve put in this relationship, you still decide to carry on. Loss aversion is not bad for you. If you were not afraid of wasting money, you would probably have asked Ngoc Trinh out. However, too much of loss aversion, together with sunk cost fallacy, would create negative impacts on your important life decisions. For example, a friend successfully talked you into joining a multi-level marketing (MLM) company. After a while, you know it’s best to quit; yet thinking about the 50 million VND you just invested in this MLM, you continue persuading your friends and acquaintances to join so that you can, at least, break even. Unable to give up on the money, the friendship, and the time that you’ve invested in this business, you keep getting deeply entangled in the MLM despite others’ admonitions. However, if you think about it, the 50 million VND is your sunk cost, just as the initial affection you had towards your girlfriend/boyfriend is a sunk cost of the relationship - there is little chance for you to claim them back. The more loss averse you are, the longer you stay in the unfavorable situations, and the bigger the sum of your losses becomes, eventually. Learn from the past, don’t live in it.