The Dark Side of Optionality
Prioritizing optionality is great for your career, but bad for your relationships
Prioritizing optionality is great for your career, but bad for your relationships. I get it, more options means more freedom and this is America who could argue against freedom. Meanwhile, commitment means responsibility which is basically the opposite of freedom. But particularly in relationships, there are insidious downsides to prioritizing optionality and real benefits to commitment.
The Rise of Optionality
At its most basic, optionality is having the choice, but not obligation to do something. So living in Airbnbs and being single offers optionality, but signing a lease and being in a relationship does not.
Now say what you want about capitalism, but it undeniably makes everything cheaper and easier giving us more and more options. And indeed in the three most important areas of life, people have more options than ever:
Relationships: Social media and dating apps
Housing: Remote work, Airbnb, Lyft, and cheap flights
Jobs: Freelancing/gig work
“Man plans and god laughs” - Old Yiddish Saying
In his books Antifragile and Black Swan, Nissan Taleb argues the importance of massive unpredictable events(Black Swans) like 9/11 or the internet makes any sort of modeling or planning for the future futile. AGI, cheap fusion energy, bioengineering, and designer babies all have the potential to dramatically change society depending entirely on which happens first. His favorite tool in this world is optionality. Similarly, Paul Graham, the founder of YCombinator and startup prophet, in a 2005 essay advises “you don't commit to anything in the future, but just look at the options available now, and choose those that will give you the most promising range of options afterward”.
In an uncertain world, optionality is very reasonable. Instead of attempting to predict the future, you instead acquire a buffet of options. Then when circumstances inevitably change, you can just respond to the present and exercise the best option. Options are the diversified portfolio approach to life where you stay adaptable in an uncertain world and you prevent a single event or black swan from devastating you.
And indeed, in the three most important areas of life, paths with more optionality and less commitment are increasingly popular:
Relationships: Stable Marriage with risk of divorce => Casual dating delaying commitment
Housing: Big local families and strong communities => Nomads and Tourists
Jobs: Stable, long term jobs => Short tenure jobs and general skills
Our culture has shifted. Optionality over commitment. Opportunism over vision. Diversified over concentrated investments. Process over substance.
The Downsides of Optionality
The most common pitfall to prioritizing optionality is never actually exercising the best option. Instead of committing to the best option, you get caught up in some intermediate step to generate more and better options. Instead of a longterm relationship, you focus on becoming attractive and high status enough to attract some imaginary future person. Instead of a real long term goal and vision of the future, you focus on the most common optionality goals: money and health. They are the “I don’t know what I actually want, but I hope this will help” goal. And as your life becomes about the pursuit of these intermediate steps, you attract people who confirm your worldview and can’t imagine the world any another way.
“Loyalty is the opposite of optionality and should only be done in relationships” - Nissan Taleb
And commitment also has upsides; there are just some benefits you don’t get unless you are all-in. In an interview, Mark Manson, a big self help author and former pick up artist, talked about how once he married his wife he felt a huge amount of cognitive capacity open up. He was dedicating a significant part of his attention and time to maintaining his dateability, noticing women, maintaining relationships, and judging his dating prospects. And with a solid MENTAL commitment, a feeling of completion in that area of his life, he felt liberated. Instead of constantly reassessing and worrying, an entire area of his life and set of problems became permanently solved.
"Most value accumulates in long term trust relationships" - Naval
And there is incredible value in trust built slowly over time. It vastly simplifies your life and conversations if you can trust the person will do what they say and has your best intentions at heart. You can avoid the mental load of the constant dance of questioning their motives, ability, and truthfulness. You can just tell them the truth and forget it. You can rely on them to be there for you when you need them. Less time can be spent preparing and imagining a future alone.
And finally committing for the long term changes the types of decisions and time scale that make sense. If you are committed to someone long term, compromise and sacrifice to help each other becomes natural as your future becomes linked with theirs. Helping them is almost as valuable as helping yourself and also inherently meaningful. Things like mortgages and children become better decisions. If you commit longterm to a specific field, then every weak connection in that industry is more likely to help you in the future. If you commit to a specific place, then every friend and favorite restaurant could become a part of your weekly routine for life. If you are just a tourist visiting the area or field for a bit, then you will naturally prioritize short term value over deep relationships and long term value. Don't be a tourist.