How to Make Tough Decision Making Less Confusing
By: Brian Kim - October 27, 2009
There will come a point in our lives where we have to make those tough decisions - the ones we turn over and over in our minds on whether or not to go through on. The ones we mull over for weeds and months on end. The ones that give us severe analysis paralysis.
It’s as if we can’t seem to get a firm grip of the whole situation. It all seems so jumbled up that we can’t take a clear COMPLETE analytical look at it. There seems to be too many different moving parts and gears going on.
So how to we make sense of all this and make this whole process of tough decision making way less confusing?
It’s like how we make all things less confusing:
WE SYSTEMIZE.
There’s 5 steps to this process and 3 of them, I’m pretty sure you’ve heard of.
The first step is to CLEARLY state the decision so that it’s a yes/no question.
Should I do x?
It shouldn’t be something like a brainstorm question.
It can’t be something like: “What’s a great career to get into?”
It should be something like: “Should I get a career in nursing?”
Then you would assume the next step is to list the pros and cons, but we have to back up here and lay down the facts of the situation FIRST.
Get some background info on your decision. Research all you can on the pertinent information relating to your decision and once you have all that info, THEN you can go to the pros and cons because having that information will come in handy in developing your pros and cons list.
Moreover, without doing your due diligence, you risk “polluting” the pros and cons list with information that isn’t even true.
Really block out everything and try to do the best you can in EACH step of the process.
Really do your due diligence.
When it comes to writing the pro list, really do your best. Think of every pro you can. Don’t hold back.
The same thing with the cons list.
The beauty in all this is SEPARATION.
Before, you’re trying to do this all at once, and that’s why it gets really confusing.
Here, you can give yourself permission to look at the decision from just ONE ANGLE AT A TIME to the fullest of your capabilities.
It’s like organizing a desk. It’s so messy that you don’t really know where to start so you keep putting off cleaning it up but once you start making neat piles – this is for faxing, this is for outgoing mail, these are notes for transcribing, these you can throw away, etc., it all becomes easier to deal with and you know EXACTLY what to do afterwards..
So once you’ve exhausted each of those steps to the best of your abilities, you come to the last part, which is arguably the most important.
After reviewing everything you’ve written down – the clear yes/no question, the background information, every pro, every con, you ask yourself this:
What are your feelings about all this?
This is key.
And note that this goes LAST.
Why?
You need to see the background information and the pros and cons list BEFORE you process your feelings because it needs that info to “process” and give back the overall vibe.
Without all that information, it’s hard for your feelings to be “right” just like it’s hard to judge something without hearing the whole story.
Go carte blanche here. Really let it loose. There’s no “wrong” feeling here. Just see what your vibe is on it. Let it out.
It’s usually comes across as a form of comfort or discomfort and it’s obvious what each of those forms mean.
What you’ll find with all this is that at the end of the day, your feelings will most likely be the deciding factor.
It’s how we usually make all our decisions, even if we are not aware of it, because it’s our intuition that’s usually right – PROVIDED it has all the right information to deal with in the first place. Your subconscious mind can process all that very quickly and give you the answer in a flash.
Once you SEPARATE each “side” of the decision making process and lay it ALL out on PAPER – there’s no more turning it over in your mind.
You’ve dumped it all and gave each “side” its place to talk so now your mind is FREE to review all the info from top to bottom in an easy, logical format and once it does all that, it can spit out the gut feeling it gets.
If you feel mostly comfortable after all that, go for it.
If you feel mostly discomfort, it’s best to avoid it.
Either way, I guarantee if you do this exercise, you’ll feel a lot clearer on where you stand and that alone will help you make your final decision way less confusing.
Please share and enjoy!: 
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