Life is all about decisions. Should I take this new opportunity or not? Should we relocate to a new location for better job prospects? Should I do the long run or heed to the imaginary injury? Should I join a class to learn something new or am I already stretched too thin? Should I stay away from that delicious cake on the table?
Some of these have high impact, life changing in some sense. Some of these do not have that high impact. Some of those affect only you as an individual; others affect your family and friends as well. Some of them are easy, the others pretty hard. However, they have one thing in common - the only way to avoid status quo and move forward is to make those decisions.
All decisions should be consistent with your values, morals and ethics. So, if an option violates your core principles, it is a much easier decision to ignore it and identify the right choice. Such decisions are taken by default and without much cognitive overload. Unfortunately, a lot of decisions that we need to make are not that black-and-white. Taking your own water bottle to work and avoiding the one-time-use paper cups is an easy decision. But what do we do when we are out of water in a hot place and have an option buy bottled water? If you are motivated enough and extremely conscious in reducing waste, like a few of my friends are, then you will find a way to avoid buying bottled water. Buying bottled water is the real last resort and you will do whatever it takes to get water through other ways. If, on the other hand, you really do not care that much, like most people are, buying bottled water is a no brainer. In either of these cases, the decision to buy or not buy bottled water is relatively easy, though the consequences may not. However, if you are somewhere in between -- you want to avoid buying plastic but not motivated enough to face the difficult consequences of not buying, it is a hard decision.
While one such hard decision is fine, making a series of hard decisions takes a lot of toll on the mind and the body. Decision making is a lot of hard work. And however "evolved" we may be, most of us tend to keep revisiting those decisions and wondering what-if scenarios, especially if things are not going the way we want. The following wonderful Thirukkural warns us against that behaviour, but then theory and practice are two different beasts.
எண்ணித் துணிக கருமம் துணிந்தபின்
எண்ணுவம் என்பது இழுக்கு.
Translation - Consider, and then undertake a matter; after having undertaken it, to say "We will consider," is folly
Over a period of time, the strain of making these hard decisions swell up and we end up with a lot of stress that manifests itself as physical symptoms like headaches or back pains.
Where am I going with all this is this? I have come to realize that it is extremely important for us to give this decision making quite some thought. We need to ensure that we can make more and more of these decisions the default way and confine only a few decisions to deep introspections. One sure way to do this is to ensure that we build a solid set of core values, principles, morals and ethics. Sitting on the fence and jumping on either side as per convenience will hurt in the long run. We need to really spend time thinking hard about what really matters to us and what our guiding compass looks like. There are some (or many) things that we may not care at all and that is totally fine. Since we do not care, either decision works and we are not stressed.
Another observation that I have had is this -- often the after-effects of the decisions are not that difficult to handle. Once we are committed, we usually do what is in our hands to improve the situation. We tend to focus on solutions. It is the ambiguity of not making the decision that hurts most. Just spending an inordinate amount of time evaluating options is the killer. It is better to time box these decisions and commit by the end of it. Too many loose threads lead to losing too many hairs.
While I have started giving this some serious thought, I will call out my favourite phrase - "knowing is not doing". It is easy to preach than practice.
