Making decisions
This page highlights key points and links to my articles on making decisions. Explore these ideas to enhance your decision-making skills, gain confidence in your choices, and learn effective strategies for navigating both everyday and significant life decisions.
Making decisions is a part of everyday life, from small choices like what to eat for breakfast to big ones like choosing a career or where to live. Some decisions are simple, while others feel overwhelming because they come with uncertainty or long-term consequences. Good decision-making isn’t about always getting things right—it’s about making thoughtful choices based on the best information available.
Instead of relying on gut feelings alone, it helps to take a step back and think through your options. Consider the possible outcomes, what really matters in the situation, and what you can control. By approaching decisions with a clear and focused mindset, you can reduce stress, avoid common mistakes, and make choices that align with your goals and values.
All articles
🔗 Biases: why you are not as rational as you like to think
Our minds naturally prefer taking the easy route and avoiding thorough thinking whenever possible because it's not the most enjoyable task. When we don't have enough information, we tend to fill in the gaps without much thought, often creating stories that seem reasonable at first glance. These stories usually help us make sensible decisions. However, due to our mental limits, we often make predictable thinking errors that lead to choices that aren't so sensible. Constantly watching out for these biases is impractical and mentally draining, but it can pay off in situations where the stakes are high.
Beneath the surface of many situations are hidden motivations or causes that shape what’s really going on. Exploring these layers can lead to more meaningful insights and better outcomes. By looking beyond the obvious, we can uncover what truly matters and make more effective decisions. However, getting to the root of a situation isn’t always easy. It often requires digging through several layers, and the connections between them aren’t always immediately clear. One effective way to do this is the 5 Whys technique—asking 'why' multiple times to reach the root cause.
Humans have natural tendencies that can sometimes lead us astray, causing us to focus only on the information right in front of us while overlooking what’s missing. If we make decisions based only on what we see or know in the moment, we risk missing important details. Taking the time to look beyond what’s immediately available helps us see the bigger picture, leading to better decisions and a clearer understanding of the world around us.
🔗 The Decision Matrix: Prioritizing decisions by their impact
It's important to consider the impact of a decision before making it. The best use of our time and effort is to focus on decisions with the biggest impact. One way to assess this is by using a Decision Matrix, which looks at two key factors: how significant the consequences are and whether the decision can be reversed. The most important decisions are those with major consequences that can't be undone.
We often make decisions based only on the information in front of us, without considering what might be missing. This can lead to poor decisions by overlooking key factors that could affect the outcome. The Possibility Grid is a simple tool that helps us spot missing information by mapping out all possible combinations of factors and outcomes.
🔗 Testing your stories: The importance of evidence
We constantly make sense of ourselves, others, and the world by automatically creating stories in our minds. Most of the time, these stories align with reality and guide sensible decisions. But sometimes, our worldview drifts from reality because of stories that obscure the truth while making us feel like we understand everything. To get closer to reality, it helps to be a little skeptical and challenge the important stories that shape our lives.
🔗 Focus on what you can control
Focusing on things you can't control wastes time and energy because they won’t change no matter what you do. Accepting uncontrollable factors as part of life frees up your energy for what truly matters. Put your time and effort into areas where you have some influence or full control. Set goals and define success based on what you can directly control.
References
Thinking, Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman