It’s Not About Right or Wrong, It’s About Being Decisive.

A mentor of mine once said, “you will never have more than 80% certainty in any decision you make, but you can have 100% control over how you react to the consequences of it”. That had a great impact on my life and my personal development.

While researching on decision-making, I started reading facts of the self-help industry. I saw that the sector was still growing during the recession in the US, over thirteen million books of self-help in the area of relationships were sold back in 2007! Imagine nowadays. The self-help field represented a $10 billion industry back in 2014. People are willing to grow! People are pursuing improvement! That is great.

I was in that boat, but I was not acting on what I was learning. I was seeking different perspectives to make decisions and live with them, but not actually deciding anything. I was overthinking and getting stuck. I bet you have experienced that before or you are going through that now! Almost of us do.

It is becoming standard for society to overthink everything. Research has proven it can be a result of stress, a sign of depression, an effect of anxiety, and a common way of processing things in our chaotic world. According to the article Survive-Overthinking on wikihow.com we start making cognitive distortions, such as believing our present scenario is absolute, it will never change! Or magnifying a problem because of a momentary feeling.

I honestly have to research deeper to understand if overthinking has been increasing due to characteristics of our overwhelming world (technologies, media, distractions, etc.). However, regardless of the sources or roots of overthinking, if we are gathering knowledge but not pushing ourselves to act on it, our growth will be limited. We will know theories but not how to apply or share them.

Being intentional about decision-making and its consequences are one of the best fields for us to be pro-active and defeat overthinking. For us to grow and retain what we learn.

We Do Not Need Science for Proof, Look around You.

I could cite articles with percentages and facts of overthinking, self-improvement, or decision-making. However, for this topic, I do not believe that it would have the same effect as you remembering a personal experience or examples that surrounded you.

Take a moment now. Think of when you did not know if the right decision for an offer should be yes or no. You were dwelling on it for so long that the moment was gone! You did not have to make a decision anymore; you lost the opportunity.

Maybe you did not take a position on an issue, and now you have to live with it. Maybe you did not say if you wanted to go out or not, and you lost your ride. Maybe you did not make a decision about talking to your significant other about the relationship, or breaking up, now both of you exploded! Horrible separation, and you will never talk to that person again.

The point is that we know, or we have seen how not making a decision can affect us more than making one. The worst thing that can happen with a wrong decision is regret, but we can learn from regret. Regret is an experience, what comes out after not making a decision is nothing.

Another valid point that you can probably relate to as well is: What you thought was a wrong decision at the time, turn out to be the right decision as you realized what you gained from it in the long run.

To illustrate this point take an example from my life. I thought that stop playing pro soccer was a wrong decision, even though I was not making anything close to a good living out of it. However, if I didn’t do that, I would not have graduated college, be close to having an MBA diploma, would not have met the woman of my life, and I would probably not live by faith in the way that I seek to do today.

Make a Decision and Walk in Confidence.

Mark Batterson wrote in his book In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day: How to Survive and Thrive When Opportunity Roars, “Embrace relational uncertainty. It's called romance. Embrace spiritual uncertainty. It's called mystery. Embrace occupational uncertainty. It's called destiny. Embrace emotional uncertainty. It's called joy. Embrace intellectual uncertainty. It's called revelation”.

It is not about feeling confident or sharing out of self-pride when the results of a decision were “as expected”. It is about feeling confident simply because you made a decision! You acted. You took a position. You are moving forward. It is not about outcomes.

It does not matter if the consequences of the decision were as expected or not, if they were positive or not, if they lead to desired results or not. Now you have a platform to use for your growth, now you can apply what you heard or read, or now you can seek more wisdom.

Make decisions. Embrace the consequences of them. Take Responsibility.

#principles #decisionmaking #character #values #SoulFUEL #growth #selfdevelopment