Why the decision is made before you are attached to the answer

Every course in this track so far has been about starting well. This one is about the decision nobody sets up in advance and everybody eventually faces, usually much later than they should and in the worst possible condition for making it.

The reason to write the rule down now is that your judgement about whether to continue gets worse over time, in a predictable direction. Six months in you will have spent money, told people what you are doing, turned down other options and attached part of your sense of yourself to the outcome. None of that is a character flaw; it is what happens to anyone who commits to something. But it means the version of you who has to make the call is the version least able to make it well.

So you make it now, in advance, while nothing is at stake and you can be honest. A written kill criterion is not pessimism and it is not a lack of belief. It is you, at your clearest, leaving instructions for you at your least clear.