Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

Decisions, decisions decisions. Do you hate making decisions? Are you one of those people who when asked, “Where do you want to eat?”, you can come up with about 1000 answers but are unable to bring it down to one.

That's not a judgment call. Because that described me for a long time, unable to make the easiest decisions in life. And when it comes to the came to the major decisions, forget it. That's where I lived most of my life. And it is a debilitating place to live. I feel like the older I got the worse my decision-making abilities became.

I felt like every single decision would hang my life in a balance. And so I just avoided making decisions. Even getting dressed in the morning became this long drawn-out process because I couldn't decide what to wear. I would start with my workout outfit.

What workout outfit should I wear?

What books should I read?

I would stand and be frozen in indecision. Decision-making is an art. It is a skill. And it is a crucial, crucial skill. And I firmly believe that as we get older we lose, we lose this decision-making ability. Because we start to think this is my own opinion, we start to think we have not as much time left. And so we are afraid to make decisions because what if it's the wrong decision? What if everything falls apart? What if? What if? What if?

Well, what if it's a great decision?

What if everything comes together on that one decision?

Or what if it's a series of decisions, and if it ends up being a decision that you don't want to change your mind? A lot of people will try to convince you that every decision is binding and permanent. And even if that decision can't be changed, there are other decisions that can change.

I was speaking with someone the other day, and I realized that she was in this place of immobility, paralysis, because of an inability to make a decision, and this was what came to my mind. I live in an area where there are a lot of roundabouts. A roundabout is where you're in your car, and you're driving, and they put you on this circle. Off of the circle, like the spokes of a wheel, there are different exits, each exit will take you someplace different. And so you're going around and around and around, and you will stay going in a circle, you're still moving, you're driving, but you are going nowhere. Just around and around and around until you choose an exit. You have to take an exit to get anywhere.

If you take an exit, and you find out that it's not taking you where you want it to go, you can go back to the roundabout, and take a different one. But you go nowhere until you choose an exit decision making is a crucial, crucial, crucial skill. And the faster that you can learn to make a decision and take action, the more your life will shift and change in the direction you want it to go. We spend years, sometimes decades, and sadly enough, sometimes our entire lives, debating on whether to do something or not. We take no action at all.

Decisions lead us to action decisions lead us to steps that lead us to change.

When I speak with women over 50, I hear all the time, “I wish I could wake up and do what I love doing.” “I would love to follow my own dreams.” “I would love to go after those things that I always dreamed about when I was a little girl.”

And it's not that they regret or that or that any of us really regret taking time to pour into our families. Where the regret comes in. And the longing comes in is that we'd like to have a chance to build our own dreams.

But how do we do that? How do we get off of the roundabout? How do we stop going in circles? We're moving. We're just not going anywhere.

How do we go from the roundabout to taking an exit? How do we start to make a decision? There are steps in making a decision. We're going to go over these now. Grab a pen and paper and write these down.

STEP 1: IDENTIFY THE PROBLEM

To make a decision, you have to first identify the problem that you want to solve or the question you want to answer. So in other words, what is the decision that you're trying to make?

Do I want to go after this goal? This dream that I've had? Do I want to write a book? Do I want to start a side business? Do I want to leave my full-time job and start my own business? Or, I would love to travel across the country, I would love to go on a trip to this place that I've been longing to do my whole life…identify the decision. That's number one.

STEP 2: GATHER ALL THE INFORMATION

Number two, gather all the information that is relevant to that decision. If you look at the example of driving cross country, what is all the information you will need? How many miles is it? How much will it cost me? How much am I going to need for this trip? Where do I want to sleep? Do I want to rent a camper? Or do I want to sleep in hotels? How do I want to handle food? Do I want to bring things that I can cook in a hotel room? Do I want to cook in a camper? Do I want to buy things that I can put together without cooking them? For that two months? Do I want to eat at restaurants? What are your decisions? What is the route I want to take? Do I want to take route 66, while I'm on my way? Do I want to drive the coast to California? Do I want to hit all 50 states?

You're going to make all of your decisions with all of your information. You're going to bring that together.

So when you're identifying your decision you're going to gather the relevant information if you want to start a business, what's it gonna take? Who do I need to talk to who can I ask about this? Do I know someone who has started a business? I want to start a podcast I want to write a book who do I know that has done that?

STEP 3: IDENTIFY THE ALTERNATIVES

Number three, identify the alternatives.

What are the alternatives? What happens if you don't go? What happens if you don't write the book? What happens if you don't start the podcast, don't leave your job, don't follow your dreams. What are the alternatives? Identify the alternatives and weigh them out.

STEP 4: CHOOSE AMONGST THE ALTERNATIVES

And the number four, you're going to choose, you're going to choose amongst all of your alternatives.

STEP 5: TAKE ACTION

Five, you're going to take action, take action.

STEP 6: REVIEW YOUR DECISION

Sixth, you're going to review your decision. So you're going to gather all the information, identify the alternatives, and weigh the evidence, choose among the alternatives, take action and then review, plan, do review, repeat, plan, do review, repeat, plan, do review, tweak, repeat, a sad tweak in their plan, do review, tweak and do is again.

Let's put this into a journaling exercise, take a journal and set a timer for five minutes, and start brainstorming everything you would love to be doing.

If you could just get off the roundabout that you've been driving for years and years, and getting nowhere. Brainstorm everything for at least five minutes, but go as long as you want.

Then, go back and start highlighting all the things that stand out to you in that list, what are the ones that really stand out to you. Identify your top five. And then journal about each one of those five alternatives, and weigh the evidence within those alternatives. Now, choose one of them. I'm not saying you can't do all five or all 10 Or all 20 that you wrote down, but you can only do one at a time effectively.

Every Sunday or every Saturday, I want you to review the decision you made, tweak it, and then move forward again. You don't change decisions because it gets hard. Because any change in life is going to come with its challenges.

What I want you to determine when you review this every week, is whether this is lighting me up? Because the challenges are exciting, when the journey is lighting you up.