Do you have trouble making decisions? Indecisiveness can sabotage your career.

Being indecisive is one of those traits that is a strength in small amounts and a weakness if it affects every decision. After all, weighing your options and ensuring you have all the information before deciding is good. But when you are paralyzed and can’t make a decision, no matter how much information you have, it is a problem.

Decision Making

Some people get through life by making snap decisions all the time, but they often produce suboptimal results that way. So that isn’t ideal, but when indecision turns into paralysis, it becomes a weakness, particularly when it becomes a regular occurrence.

Overcoming indecision is an essential component of personal growth. You can use any or all of these techniques to help you navigate making decisions.

Practice

The more indecisive you’ve become, the more you must practice making decisions. Start by deciding on small things that don’t matter, such as what to eat for lunch or which flavor of ice cream to get. Make these decisions quickly and without too much thought. Remember, these are “no-stress” decisions where nothing is at stake. This practice will empower you and build your confidence in decision-making.

Start with little decisions and move to larger, more important decisions as you feel more confident.

Make Fewer Decisions

You may be making too many decisions. Decision fatigue is a real phenomenon where the quality of your decisions deteriorates after a long session of decision making. We all have a limited capacity to make decisions daily. If you find yourself getting indecisive after making too many decisions in a day, it’s likely due to decision fatigue.

You can fix this by reducing the number of decisions you make in a day through delegation, outsourcing, prioritizing, and other methods.

I know someone who reduced the decisions she had to make during the week. On Sunday, she selected the clothes she would wear each day of the week, including jewelry and shoes.

She also went to the store and purchased items for her lunch each day. For example, she would have salad for a week and a specific type of sandwich the following week. She didn’t have to think about what she would pack or where she would go for lunch. It was all preplanned.

Put Aside Emotion

Emotions are tricky. They’re meant to help us, but sometimes, they get in the way. This is especially true when it comes to decision-making. All of our emotions, notably fear, get tangled up when making important decisions, leading to indecisiveness.

Find a way to set aside your feelings and consider decisions rationally. Use logic, not instinct, to decide on the right action. You might have to write the pros and cons on paper to see them in black and white and use logic instead of emotion.

This happened to a college student I know. They had their heart set on one college, another college with lower tuition offered him a much larger scholarship. When using feelings, he wanted to go to his first choice college. His mom put everything on paper: how much each school costs, how much we can pay, how much scholarship money you will get from each, and how much you will need to borrow and repay after graduation. She even broke it down to approximate monthly payments.

When he looked at it on paper and saw the difference in the numbers and his payments, he quickly changed his mind and decided to go to the school that offered an excellent education but would ultimately owe less.

He couldn’t make a logical decision without seeing it in black and white.

Trust Yourself

Indecisiveness is often the result of self-doubt. Deep down, you don’t trust yourself to make the right decision. Practice working on trusting yourself. Think back to decisions you have made in the past that were correct. Have confidence that you will make the right decision.

You are intelligent, capable, and competent; you can make the right decision!

Ask Someone Else

When all else fails, bring someone else in to make the decision. This should be someone you trust entirely who understands the problem and what is at stake but isn’t emotionally or otherwise tied to the outcome. Then, implement the decision. This can be a huge relief, knowing that you’re not alone in making the decision.

This is an excellent tactic when a decision has high stakes, and you are too emotionally entangled to extricate yourself enough to decide rationally. It should be used sparingly, but it is effective.

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