Costs

The upfront cost of something is rarely the true cost. Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) is the term used to attempt to quantify the true cost of something. It includes the upfront cost, plus all the additional upkeep and maintenance costs for the like of the product.

A car is obviously a great example of this. The upfront cost is only part of the true cost. After the upfront cost you have:

- Insurance costs
- Gas costs
- Maintenance costs
- Registration costs
- Tickets/fines? :(

I think this goes for things in life too. Everything we take on has a cost. A job, a position, a role...

Sometimes it is easy to feel like something does not cost a lot upfront, but it ends up costing us a lot in the long run. Thus, every decision we make is super important, even the smaller decisions.

We can take on another job/project/role/duty, but the cost of it may be doing a worse job in your other job/project/role/duty.

This analogy of cost really hits home when it comes to making bad decisions. Instant gratification type decisions. Doing the wrong thing sometimes feels like the easier choice. And it may even feel right or good in the moment. But the TCO of that action ends up costing a whole lot more than expected.

If we can stop ourselves prior to making a bad decision and ask ourselves what the total cost of the decision will be, I think we would more often than not, abandon the bad decision.