The Sunk Cost Problem

You may have spent years (or even decades) building your expertise. But is any of it still relevant? And how much of it is an active detriment to your startup?

In this special solo episode, Yaniv Bernstein delivers a no-guest monologue on the most critical skill any founder can develop right now: ‘unlearning’. Drawing on Morgan Housel's ‘Same as Ever’; real-world examples from his own startup, Vera; and frameworks for rebuilding beliefs from the ground up, Yaniv makes the case that obsolete knowledge is as bad as radioactive waste actively distorting your decisions.

In this episode, you will:

• Understand why AI is making the half-life of expertise shorter than ever before
• Learn how the sunk cost fallacy stops founders from discarding knowledge that’s causing more harm than good
• Discover why the identities you've built around your craft ("I am a programmer", "I am a copywriter") may be the single biggest barrier to adapting in 2026
• Find out what skills are actually worth holding onto, and how to combine them with the meta-skill of rapid adaptation
• Learn three practical mental models for unlearning: belief audits, first principles thinking, and systems thinking

Timestamps:

00:00 Coming Up

00:42 On Today's Show: Unlearning

02:03 Morgan Hausel's Same as Ever

04:13 When Knowledge Turns Toxic

07:00 What Unlearning Means

07:42 Why Unlearning Is Hard

08:32 Sunk Cost Fallacy

12:32 Identity Threat

17:17 Redefining Expertise

18:15 Meta Skills For Experts

21:55 Auditing Your Beliefs

24:14 First Principles Thinking

25:21 Systems Thinking

27:24 You Should: Make Time To Adapt

28:14 You Should: Embrace Discomfort

29:01 Closing Thoughts

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• 'Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes' by Morgan Housel — the book Yaniv references throughout this episode on timeless principles of human behavior: https://www.amazon.com/Same-Ever-Guide-Never-Changes/dp/0593332709
• Naval Ravikant on identity — Yaniv attributes the idea of being cautious about taking on identities to Naval. Naval's writing and podcast appearances are a good starting point: https://nav.al

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Key links

This episode of the Startup Podcast is sponsored by .tech domains.

Forget weird prefixes and creative misspellings; the availability for .tech domains is simply way better than .com. For a clean name that highlights your tech credentials, get a .tech domain at your favorite registrar.

Get your question in for our next Q&A episode: https://forms.gle/NZzgNWVLiFmwvFA2A

The Startup Podcast website: https://www.tsp.show/episodes/Learn more about Chris and Yaniv

Work 1:1 with Chris: http://chrissaad.com/advisory/

Follow Chris on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrissaad/

Follow Yaniv on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ybernstein/

Producer: Justin McArthur https://www.linkedin.com/in/justin-mcarthur

Intro Voice: Jeremiah Owyang https://web-strategist.com/

#unlearning #psychology #Startups #TechStartups #Founder #TechBusiness #TheStartupPodcast