Empowered Decision Making

"What people don't understand is they will receive far more than what they will give up when they commit to something."

This is one of my favorite quotations by author Sam Silverstein in his book No Matter What.

Commitment can be tricky because every time you decide to commit to one path, venture, job, gig, university, movie, restaurant, significant other, you are by nature saying NO to an infinite amount of other options. There is #opportunitycost on everything and it holds people back as we have an acute awareness of everything else we are missing out on when we say YES to one path. In a culture where #choice is everything many actually struggle to make choices and commit.

Fighting through that struggle is an important fight, however. Clarity of purpose is a key success principle which sets people up to actually win in what they focus on. When you are dipping your toes in the water versus jumping in the ocean head first, it makes a real difference in your outcome. What many don't realize is that, true to this quote, you actually give yourself an immense gift when you actually commit to something. First off, you actually give yourself a real shot to create success when you commit and swing for the fences. So many people play pat-a-cake and miss out immensely (please note it is not "patty cake" like I had believed all these years?!). You also give yourself peace of mind.  What a gift to press pause on the game of mental ping pong and mitigate decision fatigue in your life.  When you fail to make firm decisions you actually end up having to make the same decision OVER AND OVER AGAIN instead of once. A good example would be if you make a resolution to work out and you make a firm commitment once and stick with it. Versus every single day having to re-decide and re-commit to going to the gym. The latter is exhausting and harder work than just getting yourself to the gym!!  

By nature, I am a decisive person (it drives me nuts when I experience moments of indecision). At the root of my decision making ability is the belief system that things will work out in life no matter what direction I choose. I believe that I can make the pieces of my life work so that I can thrive, learn and create happiness no matter what the circumstance. This has been an important foundation for me! 

My top tips for being decisive and committing.....

1) More information is not always better. A yoga teacher shared this sentiment in a class recently and I couldn't agree more. In the 21st century, we have access to a crazy amount of info (and even more opinions masked as fact). Making informed decisions is important, but I didn't want to become successful at just sorting through all the NOISE. I wanted to be successful at something that would create actual #impact. Being decisive and committing opens up #mentalspace that you can now allocate to other things of greater importance. This also mitigates stress, which who doesn't want less stress in their life? 

2) Asking yourself, what's the worst case scenario? What's the BEST CASE SCENARIO? This can help you assess risk versus perceived risk. When I launched my companies at 22 years old, I had to ask myself if the risk of failure was bigger than the opportunity to become financially independent in my 20's. In this case it was a no brainer and played out how I wanted to because when I launched them I actually committed and didn't look back. 

3) DON'T LOOK BACK. When you finally make a decisive move forward put the blinders on. Don't worry about the opportunity cost of everything else you said no to by making a decision. Focusing on those other paths, girlfriends, cereal brands (we can all relate to that overwhelming feeling of too many options in the cereal aisle) you didn't choose is suicide to the path you DID CHOOSE! It's like dating someone new but continuously stalking your ex on social media....does this help your current relationship in any way (or your mental health)?  Give yourself the gift of definitiveness. 

4) Trust your GUT. It is a brilliant and powerful force that you should be listening to! When people ask me for my opinion on what they should do regarding something deeply personal I often respond by asking "What is your gut telling you?". Simple? Yes. Effective? Also yes. 

Making firm decisions does not mean you won't ever make the wrong decision. You probably will and accepting and sitting with that possibility is important. It's part of life. You might also hem and haw and spend countless hours strategizing, making spreadsheets, polling your social media community, have sleepless nights and STILL make a less than optimal decision. Nothing is completely failure proof but ask yourself "Which approach gives me greater happiness and peace?".

Cheers to commitment and making strong, confident decisions!!

Carrie

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