I think "denying that anything changes" is one of the most common mistakes I make and notice other people making. I'm choosing between a few different jobs at the moment, and I notice I actually try to construct a vision of the world where I go off and do one for 2 years, then return and do the other. Its like I want to think current opportunities will always be open to me, so I don't have to make the painful trade-off.

Now I think about it, this "freeze the world" kind of thinking is also one of the things that makes me bad at chess. I don't think enough about what other people will do, only about my own cunning plotting.