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Worrying about making the right decisions is a source of great stress and suffering for many people.
For a long time, I have struggled a lot with decision-making. Whenever a somewhat important decision showed itself, I would tense up. Those decisions were filled with so many what if’s and fear of making the wrong decision.
Additionally, conditioning made me believe that lacking the capability of fast decision-making is a sign of weakness.
So now I was under pressure from two kinds of anxieties – fear of making the wrong decision and fear of looking weak.
The last time I was going through such a phase of indecisiveness was a turning point. I was wondering what the next step in my life should be. I made a decision but then I withdrew my decision as it felt wrong.
Now I was back to wondering.
But then, because I was sick of it, I just dropped my urge to make a decision. You could say I made the decision to not make a decision. And let me tell you, I felt liberated.
This is when it struck me.
Decision-making doesn’t need to be hard. You are just made to believe that decisions, especially those that influence the trajectory of your life, are supposed to be difficult to make.
Making the right decision can be easy when you drop all the worry and tension around this subject.
Rational Decision-Making is an Illusion
There are elaborate schemes about rationally making the right decisions. But don’t be fooled, decisions are not supposed to be rational.
You cannot quantify a decision that is weaved into the context of a rich and complex life.
Making a pro and contra list, for instance, is a big self-deception. Whenever you are about to make one, you can be sure that you have already made the decision.
Pro and contra lists imply that each pro can weigh out one contra. But if you have ever made one, you know that this is not the case.
One pro may outweigh a thousand contras, and in fact, it usually does.
There is only one reason to do something – because you want to. If you find yourself trying to come up with more reasons to do something, then don’t do it.
In his book Antifragile, Nassim Taleb put it perfectly:
“If you have more than one reason to do something (choose a doctor or veterinarian, hire a gardener or an employee, marry a person, go on a trip), just don’t do it. It does not mean that one reason is better than two, just that by invoking more than one reason you are trying to convince yourself to do something. Obvious decisions (robust to error) require no more than a single reason.”
It’s Either a Hell Yes or a Hell No
I’m sure you had moments in your life when a decision was so clear to you that you can barely call it a decision.
These are the situations where you are presented with an option and every fiber of your being is either screaming hell yes or hell no.
There is no need to think about it, to weigh the pros and cons, to ask friends and family about their opinion, none of that action stemming from indecisiveness and fear.
Essentially, this is when a decision is so clear that it is self-evident.
Let yourself be guided by this feeling when you make a decision.
Indecision is Also a Decision
This is what trips most people up. How do you make a decision when you’re indecisive?
Well, you don’t.
If it’s not a clear yes or no, just let it be. This is probably contrary to what most people told you about decision-making.
Perhaps you have been brought up in the belief that knowing what to do in each moment is a great virtue. But the people who have told you this are fooling themselves.
How many people do you know who believe that they’re making the right decisions all the time?
Most of the time we don’t know what the future brings and what our next steps will look like. And isn’t this dance with uncertainty not what life is about?
Also, consider this.
When you are indecisive, you have made a decision. You have made the decision to not make a decision. And as soon as you embrace this notion, the worry and the tension about the decision fall away.
Don’t buy into the narrative that indecisiveness is a weakness. Indecisiveness just means that now is not the right time to decide on what is presented.
And interestingly enough, often, when you let go of the need to make a decision, the right decision will be apparent.
3 Practical Ways to Make a Decision When You’re Indecisive
You might be thinking the following: “What if I need to make a decision?”
Good question. The first answer is that most decisions are not urgent. Rarely there is something that demands you to choose either or right away.
But still, let’s explore this.
Sometimes there might be something pressing presenting itself. Other times there might be a part inside you that wants to make a decision now.
Whatever the reason, making the right decisions is really important to you in those situations.
If you can’t or don’t want to sit with indecision you can try the following three practical approaches.
What Do You Need for the Shift?
This approach builds on the hell yes and hell no decision-making.
Whenever you are, for instance, unsure about whether to do or not do something this option is in the maybe category.
Now you can ask yourself, what would you need in order to shift that option from maybe to hell yes or hell no? What would need to be added, subtracted, or changed so that it feels right for you?
If there is a way that the maybe can become a hell yes – meaning it feels 100% right – then move it to hell yes.
If no matter what you change, the option still feels heavy and contracting, move it to hell no.
Toss a Coin and Observe Your Reaction
Toss a coin.
But instead of just choosing whatever the coin shows, closely observe your emotional reaction to what comes up.
If, for instance, the coin shows heads, but you have a negative somatic reaction to it (e.g. contraction, heaviness, density), choose tails.
To get good at this, you have to get in touch with your body. It helps to be able to translate bodily sensations into intuitive hunches.
Choose the Option that Leads to the Most Change
This approach is also in the spirit of tossing coins.
Economist Steven Levitt conducted a study that encouraged participants to make major life decisions using a coin toss.
Individuals who, as a result of the coin toss, have chosen change over keeping things the same felt happier six months after the decision was made.
The subtle wisdom, however, is not to toss coins for major life decisions, but to choose the option that leads to the most change.
In the words of Levitt himself:
“A good rule of thumb in decision making is, whenever you cannot decide what you should do, choose the action that represents a change, rather than continuing the status quo.”
This means that if you’re feeling stuck, it’s time to shake things up.
Choosing the option that leads to the most change might introduce short-term uncertainty but it’s likely to lead to greater happiness down the line.
Final Words: Develop Your Intuition
In the end, the most powerful tool for making the right decisions is your intuition.
More than that, intuition is not just an excellent decision-making tool, but our inherent superpower. Because intuition is operating non-linear it can give us more insight into ourselves, others, issues, and life than years of accumulated knowledge.
And intuition is not just useful for those life-changing decisions but is a very practical asset that can help you guide your moment-to-moment choices in daily life.
Studies also show that successful serial entrepreneurs – meaning they have beaten the odds against success – rely on their intuition for major business decisions. (1) Highly successful individuals such as Steve Jobs, Richard Branson, Oprah Winfrey, and Albert Einstein credit much of their success to their intuition.
If you now think that you’re not that much of an intuitive person, don’t front. Intuition is a muscle and like any muscle, it can be trained.
And the more you follow your intuition the clearer will its voice become. As a result, you’ll not only be making the right decisions but upshift your reality.
If you want to learn how to develop and improve your intuition, you can check out this article.
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“Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson
Luka
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