Help with Sunk Cost
There are many favors that keep us attached to situations. Leaving a church, a relationship, a job, even a house - these are serious and traumatic decisions that shouldn’t be made lightly. The fallout can be massive and life changing. This is why it’s absolutely essential to think as clearly as possible in any of these situations.
We’d argue that under duress, in a situation that suggests it’s time to move on, true clarity isn’t possible. There are so many factors weighing on us and it’s difficult to assign true value to them.
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In a church like Wellspring which explicitly promotes lifelong membership, the idea of leaving can seem enormous, and it is. There are dozens of practical implications to leaving a church and its community. Wellspring policy has overwhelmingly promoted the sundering of relationships, so leaving carries an instant and severe cost. This is by far the biggest external factor influencing our process.
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But the internal processes can be incredibly strong as well - we believe “Sunk Cost” to be the biggest consideration. Quite simply, as members we believed that, given the years we’ve poured into the church and its activities and relationships, it just has to work out, to get better.
We even attach spiritual aspects to the Sunk Cost, variations on “God has seen the years and investments we’ve made, and He will redeem them.” It is not for us to publicly state whether those things are true or will come to pass. But we will point out that these are typical and well-trodden ways by which we seek to justify the time spent in a place like Wellspring, and critically, what influences our decision to stay.
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“Sunk Cost Fallacy” is an economic concept which describes cognitive processes whereby we behave as if money, once spent, still impacts our decision making process. Simply put, it’s the idea behind throwing good money after bad. Money, once spent, doesn’t come back, and further decisions should reflect future expenditures, not past.
Money of course, can be re-earned. Our earthly lives however are finite and we’d argue that Sunk Cost Fallacy is even more applicable to our time. We might say, “I’ve already spent 20 years here, what’s one more.”
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As we transition to middle age and beyond, an honest reckoning yields the perhaps harsh truth that we aren’t getting younger. That our time should be guarded more wisely and even jealously. This is a natural and mature approach. We see and sneer at the “mid life crisis” phenomenon but it’s a reaction to a real dynamic. Mid life - or any period - can be an invaluable time to assess and reassess our priorities.
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Sunk Cost is a consideration we can make in isolation, or, as we’ve noted, it can work alongside other factors, including spiritual considerations, as we’ve described, or blended with virtues like loyalty. These may not be harmful. But it is critical to perform sober self-assessments of the true dynamics behind our decision making. Or indeed lack of decision-making-which is of course itself a decision.
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We would argue that the dynamics of a church situation like that of Wellspring are set up to ensure that the decision-maker has , and feels, as little agency in a given moment as possible. And indeed one may feel that the decision to leave, for instance, may not be in our hands at all.
The first step to reclaiming agency is to understand the ways that we are withholding from ourselves. As someone said on this site, no one has ever regretted leaving, only the years spent inside. If indeed there is redemption, it can be in reclaiming our agency and reclaiming a life that is free from spiritual entrapment.