It’s hard to articulate, and my post was probably too pithy. I’m referring to the fact that we make most decisions in “self-driving” mode, without thinking too

It’s hard to articulate, and my post was probably too pithy. I’m referring to the fact that we make most decisions in “self-driving” mode, without thinking too much about it. But sometimes you run into a situation where you find yourself thinking “well, I could just do this, but...”. In other words, there’s something bugging you about the obvious solution and a suggestion of a harder, more difficult decision hiding behind the “but”. In that case, in my experience the difficult solution is the right one. If you consciously notice you’re about to cut corners, that means that something (conscience, instinct, whatever) is trying really hard to warn you about it. Getting back to your example, there’s no “but” attached to choosing an existing engine, so you probably wouldn’t have a nagging thought pushing you to look at building your own. So I guess what I’m really saying is “don’t cut corners”. You know you’re about to cut one when the little angel pops up on your shoulder and whispers “are you sure about this?”