7 Tips for Better Decision-Making

People typically make life choices based on their desire to feel good. This approach sometimes leads to making choices that are detrimental in the long run.

For example, when visiting a forest on a cold night, it might feel really good to light a campfire in a small clearing. However, if the forest catches fire, the long-term consequence of our choice can be devastating.

Many of the adolescents I counsel struggle with differentiating whether a feel-good choice is the best for them.

There are many examples:

• Should I enter a relationship with a significant other, even though I have not figured myself out?
• Should I drink alcohol or use weed with my friends, even though I can get into trouble doing so?
• Should I lie about what I did because if I am found out, I will be in even bigger trouble?
• Should I seek revenge when I am slighted, even though this can lead to a cycle of poor behavior?

Adults also struggle with balancing feel-good choices with the potential negative consequences of such decisions:

• Should I marry this person whom I love, even though we disagree about some important life values?
• Should I become inebriated to forget my troubles, even though a drunk state can cause life-endangering behavior?
• Should I disregard my doctor’s advice as it is inconvenient, even though this will take a toll on my health?
• Should I spend my hard-earned money on a luxury item, even though I have not been saving enough for retirement?

Many people who make poor choices act impulsively, and may not even consider the ramifications of what might happen in the long term as a result of their choice.

Such consequences not only might affect the individual but can also adversely impact the many people who interact with the said individual. Thus, a better decision helps improve us, or our loved ones, in the short and long run.

How can we improve our decision-making ability, so that we make better choices for ourselves and those we care about? Consider the following tips for making better decisions.

1. Generate Options

Before making a big decision, brainstorm and think of various options from which you can make the best choice for yourself. Be sure to consider both the short-term and long-term pros and cons of any decision.

If you have made similar decisions in the past, be sure to apply the lessons you learned from those when you are making a new decision.

2. Be Honest With Yourself

Often, we rationalize our poor choices, including with aphorisms that appear to support our impulsive decisions. For example:

• The ends justify the means. I can lie as much as I want if it gets me ahead and I don’t get caught.
• Love conquers all. We can work out our significant differences.
• You only live once. I might as well enjoy myself.

Thus, we should be aware of our propensity to support our decisions with poorly thought-out ideas. Before making an important decision, carefully consider the veracity of the rationale you have used to reach that choice.

3. Check With Someone Else

It is often hard to remain objective about our decision-making, and sometimes we suppress thoughts that might counter the choice we would like to make.

Thus, it behooves us to check with someone we can trust and who has the life experience to give us good counsel about the decision we are considering.

When we are told something we do not want to hear, we should remain humble and avoid a reflex rejection of such advice. Rather, advice contrary to our thoughts should be considered at least as a reminder to slow down in making the decision.

4. What Would My Future Self Say?

Another way to gain a different perspective regarding our prospective decision is to ask ourselves what our future self might say about it. We might consult with a future self who is a year older, and compare what they might say to what a future self who is 10-20 years older might say.

variant of this approach is to ask ourselves what an important person we admire might tell us, such as a variation on, “What would Jesus Do?” “What would my parent or grandparent say about this?” “What might my coach say?” “What would Confucius say?” “What would Albert Einstein say?”

5. Check With Your Subconscious

Through the hypnotic state, we can learn to consult with our inner self, which can be called the subconscious. Here are easy steps that can allow you to do so in the process of making a decision:

• Imagine a whiteboard.
• Ask your subconscious to write the word “Hello” on it. Make sure to wait until the word actually appears, rather than thinking of what should appear on the whiteboard.
• Once the “Hello” appears, ask if it’s OK to ask it questions.
• If you receive an affirmative response, ask if it’s OK to ask about your prospective decision.
• If you receive an affirmative response, ask, “Can you tell me what you think of my decision?”
• If you receive an affirmative response, sometimes you also need to say, “Go ahead and tell me what you think.” The reason for this last request is that the subconscious sometimes acts very literally, e.g., “Do you know what time it is?” “Yes.”
• If you receive no responses or a negative response, then accept that this method is not appropriate for you at this time. Nonetheless, you might find it useful at other times.

6. Consult a Reputable Guidebook or Web Source

There is much information available at our fingertips these days through the internet. When making an important decision, it can be very helpful to learn from such resources, as long as they are reputable.

We should also remember that books written throughout history can help make decisions today, including the Bible, Confucius’ The Analects, Plato’s Republic, Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations, the Koran, and Victor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning, to name a few.

7. Wait a Day

Some decisions only appear to be right when we think about them impulsively. Therefore, a good strategy is to wait a day or longer to give ourselves time to reconsider.

This allows us to sleep on it, which allows our subconscious to give us input during dreams. During this time, we can also allow ourselves to employ some of the aforementioned strategies to help make a good choice.

Takeaway

You can consistently make better choices for yourself by calling upon many of the resources available to you.