Life is a kind of role-playing game: a long journey filled with obstacles, where we must constantly make choices. In this world of exile, where so many things escape our control, it is normal to take the wrong path. But what is not normal is that too many people refuse to change, to question themselves. This is called the Sunk Cost Fallacy.
Examples:
Forcing yourself to finish a bad meal in a restaurant because it was expensive.
Staying in a relationship with someone who makes you unhappy because you have invested a lot in it.
Ignoring the contradictions or abuses of a religious tradition because you have devoted your entire life to it.
The sunk cost fallacy is the tendency to continue down a losing path simply because one has already invested heavily in it (time, money, energy, reputation…), instead of making a rational decision based on the present situation. Many scams rely on this bias, which is rarely discussed but leads to dramatic consequences.
This bias is linked to the ego: many people are simply unable to admit that they were wrong.
Humorous note: when one admits being wrong, one becomes an elephant / an Aleph, an animal associated with learning (see article Elephant).
“Alut Shkua” (“Sunk Cost”)
עלות שקועה
Gematria = 987
Only one verse in the Torah has a gematria of 987:
“This day you are going out, in the month of Aviv” (Exodus 13:4)
היום אתם יצאים בחדש האביב
This verse announces the Exodus from Egypt, the end of slavery.
Yet, according to Jewish tradition, the majority of the Hebrews refused to follow Moses and remained in Egypt. Their entire lives were organized around that land. Leaving Egypt would have meant losing everything they had built. Indeed, it is difficult to leave a situation in which one has invested heavily.
But one does not remain a slave simply because one has already invested too much in slavery. One must know how to leave a toxic relationship.
Past investments must not prevent choosing a better future.
How can one escape this trap?
By refining the ego and admitting that everyone can be wrong. We do not control most of the circumstances that push us to make decisions. Error is human.
But the most important thing is to understand that the “sunk cost” does not exist. Nothing is irrecoverable. One can always repair. One can elevate everything. The greatest lights often emerge from the greatest falls.
“Yerida Letzorech Aliyah” (“A Descent for the Sake of Ascent”)**
ירידה לצורך עלייה
Gematria = 700
= gematria of “Shet” (“Seth”)
שת
One must transform the fall (“Chute” in French) into Shet (Seth). Seth appears after a double fall: the loss of Paradise, and then the loss of Abel. Humanity seems to enter a moral and spiritual decline. Seth’s birth corresponds to a new beginning, a new lineage. The fall leads to a deeper, more stable foundation.
One must transform the fall into Seven. Seven, as in Malchut / the Kingdom.
Refining the ego means realizing that everything we have done in the past can be transformed into something positive.
Salvation passes through this.
This bias is found abundantly in religion. In this domain, the ground is especially fertile for it: the investment is not only material, but also existential, identitarian, social, moral…
The deeper the investment, the more psychologically impossible it becomes to step back.
Some say to themselves:
“I have devoted my entire life to this faith. I prayed, obeyed, suffered, passed it on to my children…
I cannot admit now that I was wrong.”
Such people close their eyes to contradictions and demonize criticism.
Likewise, those who have invested only in material life and not in spiritual life also struggle to realize that they were mistaken.
The sunk cost fallacy locks us into losing situations. Recognizing one’s mistakes is not a weakness, but an act of courage. Every fall can become a foundation; every loss can be transformed into Light.
The efforts invested — whether in religion (such as thousands of hours devoted to prayer) or in everyday life (such as thousands of hours spent in front of a television screen) — are never lost. Everything can be refined and elevated.
To truly ascend, one needs the Light of the New Torah. Those trapped in the snare, secular or religious, often reject it at first, because it disrupts their certainties. And yet, the New Torah requires no investment: neither rituals nor money. It is accessible to all and offers the key to escape the trap and find true Salvation.
What may seem lost must become Light.
What may seem like a fall must become an ascent.