Spent Costs

“The only way you can get ahead is to fail early, fail often, and fail forward.” ~ John C. Maxwell

Throughout life we all learn more than we can possibly remember, but there is always at least one thing that sticks with you from every subject you study.  Economics was a brief fascination of mine about a year ago (2012), while I was taking a micro-economics class.  While studying this field I encountered every term from game theory to yield, from gross to deficit, but there is one term which stuck out.  This term really has had more applications to life than economics, specifically in the field of failure.

The economic concept of a spent cost basically states that you should not consider costs that have already been made and that you cannot change when deciding on future investments.  Future investments should not depend on spent costs.   This is a slightly shallow definition, let's apply it to real life example.

I have failed many a time; recently I felt as if I "bombed" a test and that really bummed me out.  But I remembered what Robert Hillyer once said, “If you are doing your best, you will not have time to worry about failure.”  This prompted me to reconsider my focus, I began to eliminate the spent cost from my future.  This not only made me more productive, because I also realized that everyone has spent costs.  As Carole Harder said,  “87% of all things you worry about either never happen or are beyond your control anyway.”  Ironically I did just fine on the test, but I leaned an important lesson.  First, learn from your mistake, and then, if you can't change it, eliminate it.

What spent costs do you need to eliminate today?

Ps. For further reading on this concept, I'll make a post of some content I found in  Everyday Greatness; by Stephen R. Covey and David K. Hatch; Pg. (356-360) "TWO WORDS TO AVOID(IF ONLY), TWO WORDS TO REMEMBER(NEXT TIME)"

Sincerely,

-_-_- 

"7 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace 8 that he lavished on us. With all wisdom and understanding, 9 he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ" ~ Ephesians 1:7-9 

Jordan D. Ulmer