UNMADE DECISIONS ARE ACTUALLY HOLDING YOU BACK

Unmade decisions are actually holding you back!
Have you ever had a decision hanging over your head and you just couldn't commit to an answer?
You know how that feels right? It feels like you are stuck. Well, you are. It's a form of suffering and it does us absolutely no good.
The same goes for those smaller questions we ask ourselves everyday... like;
What should I wear?
What shall I eat?
Should I go to the gym?
Our brains don't like too many options because it actually takes brain energy to think through these things and our brains have developed to be as energy efficient as possible. It has been shown that our brains can only deal with a certain number of decisions a day before we start going in to
decision deficit.
Have you ever had a tough day at work then gone home and literally couldn't decide what food to cook so you just thought "Fuck it", I'll get a takeaway!"
even though you've been on healthy eating kick?


This is likely because you've hit the wall when it comes to making decisions for that day already and you've defaulted to the easiest option, though NOT the best for you.


So how do you overcome decision paralysis.


1. Prepare as much of your day in advance to free up your decisions the next day for more important things.
Decide what you'll wear the next day before you go to bed.
Decide what you are going to eat and maybe even prep your meals in advance if you're really good.
Commit to an exercise schedule and stick to it so you don't have to keep asking if you should work out or not today?
Think of what other day to day decisions keep cropping up for you and make some definite choices.


2. When you have a bigger decision to make, you have to be consious of how much pressure these things put on you.


Try to analyse the situation best you can and then make your decision.


This sounds over simplified but let's look at an example.


Say you've had a job offer and you don't know if you should take it because you don't know if you'll like it.
There is rarely a clear cut answer in these situations so making a decision either way is neither right nor wrong, what is important is that it's deliberate.
You will only find that out if you will like the job if take it, but if you feel strongly that you don't want to risk it and decide NOT to take it that's fine too.
Either way, make sure you make peace with that decision and consciously decide NOT to go on wondering what if you had done the other thing.
It's this state of indecision which is exhausting for our brains.


The quicker you process decisions the less decision debt you build up and the clearer your mind will be.


I had so much more success getting fit once I decided that I was going to exercise for at least 60 mins every day and that meant going straight to the gym after work, no excuses, end of story.
My brain was freed of that daily decision and it stopped fighting the idea as it soon became a habit.


I know all to well how it feels to live with a backlog of decisions and with bipolar when I am hypomanic I often get totally paralysed by small decisions on those days (I have less decision spoons on those days) so prepping in advance is essential.
I find jounralling is my prefered way of pre-planning my days/meals/decisions as it's something I do daily.


How is indecision causing you problems in your life?