Once prioritization is in view, the logic of time enters the picture. Many “better” outcomes depend on compounding—skills, trust, savings, health, or reputation accruing incrementally. Psychology supports this tradeoff: Walter Mischel’s Stanford marshmallow studies (late 1960s–1970s) famously explored how delaying gratification can correlate with later advantages, even if later interpretations caution against oversimplifying the results.
In practical terms, choosing the better option often means choosing the slower option. Dalio’s point is that maturity includes the patience to let small, consistent decisions accumulate into something that a string of merely “good” choices can’t match. [...]
