The Myth of Quitting: When Quitting Is A Good Idea

Quitters never win. Winners never quit.

Really now?

Have you ever started a book, but found quitting very difficult to do? You discovered that the book was leading you nowhere, but you still kept slogging through it for the next four weeks because you had spent the past two weeks reading it? Your stubborn refusal to quit could be because you felt that you were going to miss something beneficial later in the book. However, even after you got to the last page, there was nothing worthwhile you could pick out from the book. A total waste of time!

People Tend To Hate Quitting

Here’s the honest truth: People do not like to quit anything they have made some form of investment in (monetary, time-wise, emotional).

This is the same reason why people continue in unhappy relationships. They feel that they have already invested so much emotionally and monetarily into the relationship, such that it does not make sense to quit the relationship, even if it is an unhealthy one. And when you are asked why you’re still in the relationship, you sheepishly reply, ‘He/She is my bad habit…’

The same phenomenon can be seen when people lead mediocre lives doing jobs that they detest. Their response when asked why? 

‘But, I’ve spent so many years training to get into this position.”

“Would I just waste all that money I spent on that training?”

Well, you should.

Robert Greene shares the following paradigm-shifting thoughts on the better approach:

“In dealing with your career and its inevitable changes, you must think in the following way: You are not tied to a particular position; your loyalty is not to a career or a company. You are committed to your Life’s Task, to giving it full expression. It is up to you to find it and guide it correctly. It is not up to others to protect or help you. You are on your own. Change is inevitable, particularly in such a revolutionary moment as ours. Since you are on your own, it is up to you to foresee the changes going on right now in your profession. You must adapt your Life’s Task to these circumstances. You do not hold on to past ways of doing things, because that will ensure you will fall behind and suffer for it. You are flexible and always looking to adapt.”

This is why it is expedient for you to take personal responsibility for your life. No one is going to think for you. No human is going to direct you. No individual is going to be your constant go-to counselor. As I love saying, ““There would be a time in your life where all you’re left with is your two ears and the Holy Spirit within you”

We need to be aggressively attached to our vision, purpose, and destiny. We know that there is nothing as rewarding as doing what God has created you to do. But for many of us, that’s where it all ends. When we find ourselves in situations where our progress is stunted, our default mode is to become soft and sentimental. We become comfortable and unwilling to rock the boat. While we have the subconscious understanding that nothing is permanent, we become enamored with the status quo because we feel we have spent so much time invested in the current stage.

We know what to do, but we are unwilling to follow through with it. Why?

That’s the because of a phenomenon called sunk costs.

Sunk Costs and Quitting

According to Ohio State University professors, Hal Arkes and Catherine Blumer, the sunk cost effect “…is manifested in a greater tendency to continue an endeavor once an investment in money, effort, or time has been made. The prior investment, which is motivating the present decision to continue, does so despite the fact that it objectively should not influence the decision…the psychological justification for this maladaptive behavior is predicated on the desire not to appear wasteful.”

A classic example of the sunk cost effect is found in the curious relationship between David and Jonathan. According to the power dynamics in a kingdom, when a king dies, his heir is usually the next person to step up to the throne. Saul was the king of Israel and it was only natural for him to secure the kingdom for his son, Jonathan, by getting rid of any potential threat to the kingdom. In this case, the threat was David. However, since the kingdom of Israel was a Theocratic one, God stood as the Ultimate Kingmaker. And the Kingmaker had rejected Saul as king and selected David in his state.

Now, here’s where it gets interesting.

Saul knew that God had rejected him as king. Jonathan also knew that God had chosen David to take the place of his father as king, which by implication also meant that his own path to the throne was a foregone conclusion too. Even more baffling, 1 Samuel 23:17 records Jonathan, the Crown Prince, practically telling David that he was ready to be his second-in-command. This goes to show how sensitive Jonathan was to the choices of the Kingmaker.

Yet, by 1 Samuel 31:2 Jonathan was a dead man – killed in battle fighting for a king that had been rejected by God.

So, why did Jonathan refuse to leave Saul and join forces with David to form a formidable kingdom? While the Bible does not specify exactly what transpired, it is easy to see the sunk cost effect play out in this scenario. Obviously, it is safe to assume that familial ties played a role in Jonathan’s decision to stay put with Saul. Perhaps, though, Jonathan had spent time trying to win his father’s approval, and he felt that he could not leave his father until he got some kind of affirmation. Perhaps Jonathan had grown to develop an emotional attachment to the wealth and trappings of his father’s kingdom that he found it difficult to much of a cost to abandon that lifestyle and become like the nomadic David. Whatever the reason was not quitting his allegiance to his father, Jonathan succumbed to the sunk cost effect and lost his life for it.

Quitting Because of The Truth

So, what should be your thought processes before quitting? Since, we are going to encounter certain difficulties in the course of our life journey, it makes sense to have some kind of checklist that would make us easily decide whether we should plough on with gritted teeth, or we should pull the plug and call it quits.

Author and lecturer Jim Collins shares a discussion he had with Admiral Jim Stockdale, a US military officer who had been captured by enemy soldiers during the Vietnam War. While in prison, Stockdale survived about 20 different torturing sessions from 1965 – 1973. When Jim Collins asked about the captured soldiers who died in the Vietnamese prisons, Stockdale replied:

“Oh, that’s easy, the optimists. Oh, they were the ones who said, ‘We’re going to be out by Christmas.’ And Christmas would come, and Christmas would go. Then they’d say, ‘We’re going to be out by Easter.’ And Easter would come, and Easter would go. And then Thanksgiving, and then it would be Christmas again. And they died of a broken heart…This is a very important lesson. You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end—which you can never afford to lose—with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.“

The last statement of the quote is a very important mindset to have when gauging the right time to call it quits. To be able to know when quitting should be an option, you need to have the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be. A lot of people do not have an appreciation for the truth. They are not willing to tell it, even to themselves, because they do not want to associate with the uncomfortable feelings that accompany telling the truth. As Winston Churchill quipped, “Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing happened.” You need to be willing to engage in those uncomfortable conversations with yourself, and others, if applicable.

Quitting Because of Pareto

The very fact that we are humans implies that certain elements of our existence are limited. We do not have enough time and resources to do everything by ourselves. By implication, that means that there are bound to be trade-offs and opportunity costs that we have to give up in our day-to-day activities. When you spend time and resources in doing certain tasks or activities, by default, you are also ignoring some other activities. The only criteria that then determines where you expend your time and efforts are the expected outcomes of the activities, as well as the satisfaction you derive from such activities.

Vilfredo Pareto was an engineer, sociologist, and economist who came up with the mathematical formula used to demonstrate the distribution of wealth in the society. By studying the distribution of land and landowners in Italy, he found that 80% of wealth and income was produced by 20% of the population. He found this phenomenon to be applicable in almost every aspect of life. Nowadays, Vilfredo Pareto’s observations, now dubbed the Pareto Law has been used by different companies in their efforts to maximize their efficiency and profits due to the fact that they have limited time and resources.

You can use Pareto’s Law to do the same thing when trying to determine the circumstances where quitting would be the best option. For instance, since 80% of the consequences arise from 20% of the causes, you may decide to find out the top 20% of the sources that are causing 80% of the problems, stress and unhappiness that you are experiencing in your life. Once you have identified these sources by being brutally honest with yourself, then you can focus on quitting these activities while focusing your resources on the activities that bring you the best outcomes.

Quitting a business, a relationship, a book, or an activity does not mean you are a weakling. Neither does it mean that you are conceited, arrogant and full of yourself. Quitting does not render you a second-class human. Contrary to that, sometimes, quitting is a sign of responsibility and maturity. It could be a sign that you value the seed that God has deposited within you and you are willing to get rid of the thorns of distraction that would choke that seed. Sometimes, quitting could end up being a pointer to the fact that you are committed to nurturing that seed into a plant that yields its increase in its thirties, sixties, and, hundreds.

According to the words of Tim Ferriss, “Slow down and remember this: Most things make no difference. Being busy is a form of laziness – lazy thinking and indiscriminate action”