Decision Making: We can do better.

If we could focus on what’s possible, more often, rather than what isn’t, we all be a lot better off.

We have a habit of preparing ourselves for what we can’t do, which limits us in what we believe we can do. What if we switched this mindset around?

What if we eliminate the fact that there is no “can’t do”.

We manage to stop ourselves before we start sometimes. More often than you probably realize.

We use our past, current circumstances, society and the influences of others to make decisions. Often cutting ourselves short of what could be possible.

We do it out of habit, and the thing about habits, are we don’t even notice we’re doing it.

It’s very beneficial to start to notice next time you’re about to make a decision, big or small, take note of what you’re using to base your decision on. What thoughts are popping up? What filters are you running it through?

This can be a hard mindset to shift, but it can be done. We need to get use to asking ourselves the right questions when making decision. We also need to learn how to trust our own intuition, even when it doesn’t match up well with our past, circumstances, society and the influence of others. It almost never will.

We reach for things, reasons, justifications to grab hold of, to make decision making less scary and less risky. We want security, insurance and to know it’s the best decision.

It use to take me forever to make a decision. In my first business, I was faced with these decisions on a daily basis. It’s like all I did was make decisions all day long. I hated making decisions and never dreamt the amount of choices and confusion that would come along with it.

It would always take me way to long, over analyzing the shit out of every little thing. Continuously asking myself, What’s best? What will people think? What am I afraid that will happen? What is the safest route?

When in reality, I already knew deep down what the best choice was, my gut would chime in with what was best for me and the business, but my ego would always highjack it, it just didn’t seem to ever go that smooth, without the analysis of fear based thoughts.

Looking back, I would have chose not to be so safe, secure and conservative. I had a good thing going and if I could go back and do it again, I would have went full throttle. I would have went with those gut feelings and took more risks.

The decision making alone, in that business, burnt me out. It caused massive stress for me because I made decision making hard. It didn’t have to be as stressful as it was. I was just so afraid of doing things “wrong”, that I played it as safe and small as I could.

Big, wild, bold decisions that will get attention is what I should have been choosing.

But lesson learned.

I’ve come up with a quick way, when making decisions, to ensure that I’m not caving to the influence of others and to just play it safe, but using my intuition and my intentions to call the shots.

:: How do I want it to make me feel?
:: Does it bring me closer or further away from my intentions/goals?
:: What is my intuition/gut/higher-self trying to communicate?
:: What feels right?

Try your best to ignore the fear based thoughts that tend to pop up. Ignore the wondering thoughts of “what will people think?” Ignore what is the safest, surest bet.

:: What feels free?

Ignoring those things we normally use as a gauge in making decision, can feel like free falling, but once you make that decision and you say “yes”, the scary part it over, now you’re going with it.

I’ve learned that you can become accustomed to that free falling, scary feeling, and it doesn’t last as long as you think.

We are not usually down with “not knowing”. We are addicted to safe and for sure. When we let go, and make bold decision that honour who we really are and what we really want, it’s foreign, but it doesn’t have to mean it’s scary.

Creating any kind of change is hard. We are creatures of habit, and changing the way we make decisions is no different.

At the end of the day, we are all faced with decisions, especially as entrepreneurs, and the quicker we can find a way to make good, smart decisions that move us forward in the direction that we truly want to go, we become more comfortable making decision.

Those big things we want to happen, are made up of all the small decisions we make along the way. Let’s be more diligent in ensuring that the small decisions reflect our end goals.

We can do better.

Who else struggles with making decisions? Share with me, your experiences.