You can also understand this as saying “You allocate time to tasks according to how much you want to do them”, an observation which also does not always rise to the conscious level.
This also requires a strange definition of “want” in order to become correct. Actions chosen for instrumental reasons sometimes differ from both the emotional urge and the all-else-equal reasoned preference, and so it’s not particularly natural to include them under the label of “wanting”.
I see no problems with filing “actions chosen for instrumental reasons” under the category of “want” in this context. They could be consolidated with their goal, anyway—for time allocation purposes there is not much sense in separating “walking to the fridge and opening it” out of the general “get a beer”.
This becomes problematic when you try to distinguish an instrumental decision from its terminal valuation, for example “I don’t want to be commuting to work, but I choose to do so in order to get there.” (negative all-else-equal valuation, positive instrumental valuation).
This also requires a strange definition of “want” in order to become correct. Actions chosen for instrumental reasons sometimes differ from both the emotional urge and the all-else-equal reasoned preference, and so it’s not particularly natural to include them under the label of “wanting”.
I see no problems with filing “actions chosen for instrumental reasons” under the category of “want” in this context. They could be consolidated with their goal, anyway—for time allocation purposes there is not much sense in separating “walking to the fridge and opening it” out of the general “get a beer”.
This becomes problematic when you try to distinguish an instrumental decision from its terminal valuation, for example “I don’t want to be commuting to work, but I choose to do so in order to get there.” (negative all-else-equal valuation, positive instrumental valuation).
Again: in this context. Sometimes you need to decompose instrumentality from its terminal goal, sometimes you don’t need to.