Why Having Less Options Makes You Happier

A few months ago, I was of the opinion that having more choices to decide something and having more of everything helped you make better decisions and feel happy respectively. It was only when I analyzed this and tried the opposite of it that I realized how wrong I was. A plethora of options and the need to get lots of stuff is a big reason behind our never-ending stress and anxiety which consequently makes us unhappy.

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About 6 months back, I was working on a book and the client’s instructions required me to go through the ‘The Paradox of Choice- Why More is Less’ by Barry Schwartz. As I went through excerpts of the book, I realized that one of the many reasons behind the stress I constantly experienced was that I had surrounded myself by a plethora of items that always required me to make a tough decision when opting for something. For instance, I had lots of clothes about 6 months back and each time I had to choose a nice outfit to go out somewhere, I had to go through about two dozen outfits to pick one. Each time I had to pick out an outfit, I used to spend a lot of my time weighing the reasons why I should wear and why I shouldn’t wear a certain outfit. More often than not, I used to end up not going out at all because I used to feel extremely overwhelmed in the end. Not only that I used to end up disliking my wardrobe even more because it hardly had any decent outfit.

While going through the Paradox of Choice, I realized how owning more stuff and surrounding myself with lots of choices was adding to my routine stress. It took me a while to prepare myself to let go of the extra stuff and choices I was surrounded by along with the stress it was bringing in my life. I decided to go slow so I stayed steady and got rid of a few worn out clothes from my wardrobe. I had now reduced the number of options I had and I felt a little better than before. Each week, I used to get rid of at least 2 outfits and accessories from my wardrobe that I knew I wouldn’t wear and those that did not look good on me. After 2 months, I had only about 8 outfits in wardrobe and all of them were actually good and those that looked nice on me. Each time, I had to go out, I used to pick out one outfit from the eight and my life had suddenly become easier, lighter and more peaceful than before.

When you have a fewer choices to choose from, you spend less time deciding what to pick and what to forego. This helps you save time and come up with a decision faster. Moreover, fewer choices also make your life easier and more comfortable. How? When you have lots of stuff to choose from, you go through lots of comparisons and those comparisons often make you aware of your poor choices or decisions. For instance, when I used to look at a certain kurta of mine, I always used to think ‘Why I bought this?’ and ‘I could have spent the same amount which was about $20 on something better’ almost every time I picked it up. This used to stress me out more every time and make me feel bad.

Moreover, sometimes certain things make you recall a bad memory which consequently increases your stress. All of this gets eliminated when you stick to a fewer choices. For instance, when you have just two pair of jeans to choose from, you know you’ll wear one which is cleaner and quickly put it on and leave for work without going through the extra hassle of deciding what to wear and what not to wear.

Barry Schwartz talks about how too many choices paralyze us when it comes to doing grocery. When you have 30 types of ketchup brands to choose from, it naturally becomes very difficult for you to make the decision. While you cannot get rid of all the brands from the market to make the decision easier for you, you can try one or two and then stick to what works best for you so you don’t have to make the hard decision every time.

To become happy and to let go of undue stress lingering on in your life, limit the choices around you. Get rid of the extra stuff in your life; stop analyzing everything in detail before deciding something and try to stick to things you are sure about. Yes, you need to make in depth analyses at times when the decision you need to take is a tough one. That’s when you should really brainstorm and go through every option available but for everything else, limit your choices and keep things easier for yourself.

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