I was listening to Tim Ferriss, and his discussion with Mr. Money Mustache. I enjoyed the entire discussion and would recommend listening to it all…but my favorite quote was the following, with regards to personal finance and expenditures:

“If you can’t afford to lose it, you can’t afford it.”

I loved this. Mr. Mustache (Pete Adeney), I think, does well to see money spending as a psychological act with short and long term consequences that need to be thought through. Increasingly, I’ve been reveling in all sorts of stuff that I find, initially, less valuable.

For example, I’ve recently been shredding on my brothers 1997 Klein Attitude Race…

It has seen better days, but it still gets the job done. All the while, the fact that the bike is 20+ years old and still going strong(ish) gives me extended utility. that, and the fact that if I were to destroy it, I’d feel no strong sense of loss (I’ve thoroughly benefited from any reasonable expectation of its life cycle)

So, because I don’t think of it as so important, the bike (or whatever other less valued object it is) doesn’t worry me. I CAN afford to lose it. And, as a result, paradoxically, I find that the object then increases in value for me.

Is this behavior of mine rational, or the opposite?