Aside: I’ve picked jobs and houses to reduce commute time, and I’ve never regretted it. I have discovered that it’s a threshold for me (satisficing, not optimizing), and that modality matters—I enjoyed the 15-minute walk and the 10-minute bike ride, but not that much more than the 35-minute walk-and-train. The 45-minute bus and the 60-minute drive were both unpleasant enough to change, but worth it for some time. I do suspect the “would have killed me” overstatement weakens your evaluation—you can survive many unpleasant things for quite a while, especially if you’re working toward improvement (say, moving closer to work). This example isn’t a decision, but the evaluation will impact future decisions, so it’s worth being at least somewhat rigorous in your thinking.
Related to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halo_effect (and the reverse, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horn_effect). I think this is mostly a salience error—it’s easier to focus on one side or the other at any given time, and much more work to find balance or acknowledge tension.
Aside: I’ve picked jobs and houses to reduce commute time, and I’ve never regretted it. I have discovered that it’s a threshold for me (satisficing, not optimizing), and that modality matters—I enjoyed the 15-minute walk and the 10-minute bike ride, but not that much more than the 35-minute walk-and-train. The 45-minute bus and the 60-minute drive were both unpleasant enough to change, but worth it for some time. I do suspect the “would have killed me” overstatement weakens your evaluation—you can survive many unpleasant things for quite a while, especially if you’re working toward improvement (say, moving closer to work). This example isn’t a decision, but the evaluation will impact future decisions, so it’s worth being at least somewhat rigorous in your thinking.