Working on my relationship thinking → Exercises → [[Tim Urban]] → Gut thought experiments →

Find out where your gut is leaning, using thought experiments:

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Examples

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Imagine you were being arranged married by the town matchmaker and she handed you an envelope with your to-be spouse’s name written inside. You open the envelope and it’s the name of your current partner.”

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Feel pretty good then, not ecstatic but not bad

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Glad to have some validation that I just need to work on this relationship not go trying to do better

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7/10

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Picture two gravestones next to each other—yours and your partners. Does that feel right?

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5/10, ok

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If there were a big green button in front of me that, if pressed, would make me fully single, where everything has been worked out with getting our things from each other’s apartments, where everyone in my life already knows, and where I’m totally emotionally recovered and moving on—in fact, I have a date tonight—would I press the button?” (and / or immersed in new relationship)

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This one’s hard. Feels like this is the one that makes or breaks it. Holding all else equal would I take a new relationship at the same point?

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What if The Decision weren’t between breaking up and marriage, but only between breaking up and committing to the relationship for the next five years?

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Not super helpful, since it’s a pretty important 5 years

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