Have you ever been challenged with a difficult decision before?
How do you decide which choice will be the correct one for you?
Everyone has a process for decision making.
Let me repeat this…
Everyone has a process for decision making.
Sometimes we make decisions decisively.
Sometimes we hem and haw over our decisions.
Sometimes we get so overwhelmed that we don’t make a decision.
Or so we think.
In reality, not making a decision is a decision.
Here is the cold hard truth.
Most of the decisions we make in life are inconsequential.
More than 80% of our decisions will have little effect on the course of our lives.
However, less than 20% of our decisions will be important decisions.
We want to ensure that when we have the opportunity to make the less than 20% of our decisions that are truly impactful that we make the right decision.
Decision making is a skill.
The only way to get better a making decisions is to make decisions.
We will always make bad choices when we make decisions.
Let me pause for a minute to reframe the sentence I just wrote.
We will always make choices that give us outcomes that were not the outcomes we desired.
I want to stress this point because it is a critical point that I just learned in the last seven months.
For so much of my life, I wanted to be perfect.
For so much of my life, I didn’t want to make mistakes.
For so much of my life, I let the fear of making a mistake rob me of the most precious thing I have which is my life.
You see, we don’t know how much time we will have on this earth.
We don’t know if we will rise tomorrow when the sun rises.
What I’ve come to learn is there are no bad choices.
We are all flawed.
That is the special gift that we have as humans.
Someone told me last year there are no failures. There are only learnings.
If we don’t succeed today, we are given lessons on what didn’t work.
We learn what didn’t work.
Sometimes knowing what doesn’t work can be more valuable than knowing what does work.
But it hurts when things don’t work our the way we wanted them to.
So what.
To live is to experience pain.
Get over it.
Or you can crawl up in your cocoon of mediocrity and live a life of quiet desperation.
No thanks. That’s not for me.
I want to experience it all.
I want to feel the pit of despair when things don’t work the way I want them.
If I don’t wade through the struggle, then I will never know the fulfillment that comes from pushing through, sticking with it whenever everyone else quit.
I will never know the sweet nectar of victory without paying the price.
Let me be clear about this.
You will never experience success if you don’t experience failure.
It’s ok to fail because failure indicates that you risked something.
If you didn’t have enough gumption to go out on a limb, you wouldn’t have the opportunity to win.
You can only win when there is a chance to lose.
So, we have to get comfortable with taking chances.
We have to get comfortable with experiencing failure.
We have to make decisions quickly so we can figure out what will work.
That is the best way to make progress.
Make a bunch of mistakes.
The great thing about making mistakes is that we know when we make mistakes.
It’s painful to make those mistakes, and we understand viscerally that we are better off making a different choice.
I remember the first time (let me rephrase this only time) I touched a hot iron.
I learned it didn’t feel hurt to touch a hot iron as I burned myself.
Then the next day, I saw the blister as a reminder that it is not wise to touch a hot iron.
I don’t touch hot irons anymore.
I gain experiential knowledge by making decisions quickly.
Even when it’s a big decision, we are better off deciding quickly.
This last week I was presented with a big decision.
Now mind you, there are still many unknowns with this decision.
Let me remind you that I have four children.
There were many unknowns when my wife and I decided to have each of those children.
Each one of those children is a source of great joy in my life.
And there are still lots of unknowns related to each of my four children.
My wife and I didn’t let the unknowns keep us from deciding to bring our children into the world.
Big decisions are big decisions, but we don’t need to spend much time on those decisions.
I was talking with a mentor Scott Whitaker, and we were discussing the pros and cons of the decision.
Once Scott and I covered all the relevant data points of the decision, he asked me to take out a quarter out and play the heads or tails game.
First, I would decide that heads meant yes, move forward with the decision and tails would represent not moving forward with the decision.
Next, I would flip the quarter up in the air and catch the quarter in my hand and keep it covered.
Before I revealed if the quarter were heads or tails, I would ask myself this question.
What do I want the quarter to show?
Do I want it to show head or tails?
The first answer that comes to my mind is the correct choice.
If I wanted heads, then that means I know in my heart that it makes sense to move forward.
If I want tails, then that means I know in my heart that it makes sense not to move forward.
Now before you go on saying, Damon, that is a bunch of mumbo jumbo psychobabble, let me share a quick thought with you.
For most of our decisions, we have a 50-50 chance of choosing the correct choice.
Something will always go wrong or not as we intended it to go.
There will always be roadblocks with any decision we make.
So if most of the decisions we make in life are inconsequential and we have a 50% chance of success and a 50% chance of failure, let’s not belabor the time we spend making a decision.
If flipping a coin to make a decision results in quicker decision making, then carry a quarter with you nonstop and flip a coin.
What’s the worst thing that will happen when you make the “wrong” choice?
Spending too much time making a decision is a waste of time.
Let’s take the shortcut to success and make a lot of decisions quickly.
Make a decision to improve your profits today.
If you’re looking to grow your business profits and having more cash in the bank, send me an email at damon@idealmoneylife.com with “PROFIT” in the subject line… tell me a little about your business and what you’d like to work on together, and I’ll get you all the details!
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