Eric Siu and a guest discuss how every choice comes with hidden costs. You picture the dream house but not the repairs and taxes. The recurring insight: you choose your suffering.
The person you marry is the person you fight with. The house you buy is the house you repair. The dream job you take is the job you stress over. Everything comes with an inherent sacrifice. Whatever makes us feel good will also inevitably make us feel bad.
The way our brain works is that when we dream about some sort of future or goal, we tend to only think about the positive aspects of it. If you think about your dream house, you just think about how awesome it's gonna be to be in that house. You don't think about fucking toilet clogging or the repairs or the taxes or any of the icky annoying stuff that comes with homeownership. That's like a fundamental part of it.
Same thing with getting a dog.
Totally.
Same thing with a relationship.
I married a fiery Brazilian because I'm like, man, she's so passionate, she's so emotional. And then like, you know, when we have a fight, I'm like, goddamn, do you have to be so emotional?
That's what I chose. You choose your suffering.
Yeah, exactly. You choose your suffering. And I have a saying that I love, which is like the best thing about a person or a thing is also usually the worst thing.
