What are you tangled up in knots about right now? I bet you've got a decision weighing on you. Whether it's a job offer, a location change, a relationship worry or a project at work, odds are you're facing decisions.
I'm not a psychic, and I can't see inside your brain. I just know that the average person makes 17,000 decisions a day, which can close to double in uncertain circumstances like lockdowns and personal change.
When we treat decision-making like a mental exercise, it's draining. We lie in bed at night with thoughts racing through our mind, scribble notes in our notebook and endlessly Google for advice. (If I ever have a team of cyber forensics go through my Google history, I'm not going to come off well.)
All good decision processes include action. When we're trapped in our own heads, we're blind to so many assumptions and options. When we expect perfection or accuracy straight away, we can wind up frozen and frustrated.
The trick is to try something. When we treat our lives like a series of experiments, it rather than significant milestones, the pressure releases and we can be lighter with ourselves.
What's the minimum viable decision?
Think about the smallest possible thing you can try to experiment with options for your tricky decision.
How can you fail faster?
When you commit a small amount of time, money or energy, you feel better about losing it. Go in expecting it to be a write-off, and be pleasantly surprised if something pans out.
Take a chance
You don't know what you don't know. When you do things, you immediately understand them better. That's why with naMBA, we complete a small project every week to immediately apply what we've learned to our work and lives. All the online article scrolling in the world pales in comparison to an afternoon of experimentation.
What can you test out to get clearer on your choices?
Til next week,
- A
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Alicia McKay