Opportunity Cost: The True Cost of Staying When You’re Really Not That Into Him

Happy Valentine’s Day! To all the single ladies out there: don’t feel down, you’re actually further ahead than you think!  Here’s how it works on the other side:

In a relationship, there might come a time when you realize that you’re just not that into him. He could be a perfectly nice boy, but things are just not working. What to do then? We’ve all been there: too much doubt to stay, too afraid to leave. What if this is as good as it’s ever going to get? At least I have somebody now, and that’s better than nobody, right? Hey, it’s not like I’m doing much this Saturday night anyways, what’s the harm?

The harm lies in the loss of opportunity to doing something else, the potential for something better. In economics it’s called the Opportunity Cost. If a company chooses Project A over Project B, it’s taking into consideration not only the cost of funding Project A, but also the lost profits from not funding Project B. Opportunity cost is as real as cold hard cash spending, though it’s often tougher to measure.

Maybe if you stay in Saturday night, you’ll finally get around to setting up a proper online dating profile, and that would lead to a flood of dates next week. Maybe if you go to Aunt Sally’s birthday party, you’ll get to meet her neighbour’s cute nephew.

The point is, you never know. And that chance of missing out on something great is the real cost of staying with someone you’re really not that into. Sometimes it’s easy to discount opportunity cost, because you won’t know what you’re really missing if you’ve never had it. It’s an important cost to consider, nevertheless. Until you let go of the old, new opportunities might never present themselves. Sometimes, you have to be very single to become very un-single.

So bravo, single ladies!