Imagine waking up as the Prime Minister tomorrow.
Would the fear of making 100 decisions paralyze you?
If so, you are not alone.
Not being good at decisions slowed me down for years.
It took me:
5 years to decide I don’t want to be an engineer
7 years to write what I want to write
9 years to decide I want to marry my best friend
At some point, we all suffer from the devil of indecision.
It has affected Michael Jordan and Kanye West.
A 2010 study found 20% of the US adults are indecisive.
Even the innocent SpongeBob SquarePants.
Today, we'll break down indecision and find ideas to beat it.
If you face difficulty making decisions, this letter may help you.
Let’s beat the devil together.
Indecision is the inability to make decisions.
We can overcome it with a simple process:
Step 1: Identify its sources
Step 2: Take baby steps to beat it down.
First, let’s explore four common sources that feed this devil.
Lack of self confidence
Fear of choosing wrong
Parental influence
Lack of information
Refer to 👇 thread for a breakdown of sources.
If any of these sources ring true, work on that first.
Decision making will sort itself.
Can’t relate to the sources but still want to figure out?
Reach out to me here. Let’s find out together.
Moving on.
How to sharpen our decision making
Let’s find out how Mark Zuckerberg decides things.
He might be the CEO of Facebook.
But his daily job is making decisions.
Can we steal his strategies?
Picasso wouldn’t mind.
Back in 2014
I read Mark wears a grey hoodie every day.
It had a profound effect on me.
But why would he do that?
Wearing the same thing every day sounds crazy. 🥴
What would people say?
But does Mark care about it? I don’t know.
Does he care about his purpose in life? Yes.
I want to clear my life to make fewer decisions about anything except how to best serve the community.
—Mark Zuckerberg
That tells us…
Mark doesn’t waste mental energy on decisions he could automate.
The same hoodie is to free his mind.
If we ask a psychologist, they’d tell us Mark is solving decision fatigue.
Decision fatigue is mental exhaustion. Makes decision making difficult.
It occurs when you have too many decisions to make.
An average adult makes about 35,000 decisions a day. 226 on food only.
A child only makes 3000.
Probably that’s why kids always know what they want.
Decision fatigue harms the quality of your decisions.
—Psychology Today
In simple terms, you have limited fuel of making decisions.
Think how your phone’s battery drains when you play too many games.
Similarly, when you make too many decisions, you hang.
You work against yourself in three ways:
Drain your mental energy.
Make poor decisions.
Start to avoid decisions altogether.
Result: you end up harming your decision making abilities. 😟
Error 404. Decision fatigue is a hell. Don’t go there!
What can we learn from Mark
Automate small decisions to save energy for big ones.
Realize this 👇
Decisions like eating / clothing slow us down.
They burn our decision making fuel. For free.
Waste our time every day. Yup, free. 🤯
We can’t measure decision fuel. Yet.
But the loss of time looks like this.
50 minutes a day!
That’s 305 hours per year… 😮
In other words, I’m spending 12 days a year deciding what to wear and eat.
What kind of a homo sapien am I? 🙄
But don’t worry, learning from Mark, I have sorted this for myself.
Let me show you how.
What to wear
The same hoodie every day made perfect sense. So I did a tiny experiment.
My hypothesis: If I create a clothing style that is both flexible and limited, I can reduce the time and mental energy spent on choosing and buying clothes.
Since then, I only shop once a year.
My shopping list is clear before I visit a website.
One blue jeans, 2 black sweatpants
5 comfy shorts for summer
10 simple tees in various colors
That's my shopping. That’s my outfit.
I can give this list to anyone to outsource shopping.
Even my 10 year old friends can shop for me
Cost of experiment:
Overcome social approval.
Learn to own my choices.
That was the only work I had to do.
Results:
Plenty of mental space recovered. Decision fuel saved.
The what to wear decision takes no more than 5 secs.
Bonus: I’m able to wear — whatever I grab first. 😃
After that, I decided to ditch ironing as well.
Made two tiny changes:.
Stopped using a towel.
Put on tees right after shower.
An hour later, I get a free ironing.
Thanks to the natural drying process.
Just have to hang in there and let the universe do its spook shows on me.
For shopping
I shortlisted three websites that sell exactly what I want.
I buy from them repeatedly to become their A-list customer.
Builds trust both ways. Increases my LTV in their dashboards.
I subscribe to their email / social so I can buy when there’s a sale.
Time and money saved.
Decision fuel saved on where + when to buy. 💪
I can say I only wear what ELO, Kotton Fruit, and BlueShoppy sells.
If I break protocol, it’s either a present or my wife had ideas.
Sometimes it's fun to break your own rules with loved ones.
What to eat
The eating decision was another time waster.
So applied Mark’s model again.
I noticed I love biryani. And found some benefits…
Eater-friendly — eat in a car, while standing, in a moving train.
No need to wash hands before / after.
Easy to digest.
I was sold.
Biryani became my go to meal.
If you ask my friends, they’d tell you I have destroyed it for them. 🙊
Whenever they’d ask “what will you eat?”
I smiled back. And they knew.
But how to eat something repeatedly?
By understanding this 👇
Food is a necessity. Not entertainment.
I attach no aesthetic, aromatic, or culinary pleasure to food.
If it’s tasty, great. If not, I’m grateful it filled my belly.
Probably that’s why I hate fancy food. (Also why I loved The Menu.)
So I happily eat biryani daily. Can cook it in 30 minutes.
For days I don’t want to cook
I build relations with good biryani shops in my area.
The idea is to differentiate myself to become their best customer.
If I try a new biryani, I make sure to meet the owner.
After sharing my compliments and review, I propose a deal.
Deliver on call — at walking distance — to my place. Get 50 Rs extra.
Smart owners agree. Others don’t. But I keep trying.
This allows me…
To not keep Foodpanda on my phone.
Because I hate being stuck in a choice paradox. 😫
Food delivery apps do that. They spark decision fatigue.
In my foolish opinion, Foodpanda should pay us to use their app.
The mental cost of these apps is heavy, folks.
Too expensive! I ain’t buying.
That’s how we I save decision fuel.
I do it because why not.
There’s nothing to lose in experimenting with yourself.
You either win or you learn. There is no probability of loss.
Think this 👇
Is an experimental life better than living on rigid principles?
Up until here, we have figured how to save energy to make big decisions.
Let’s make it fast.
How to make decisions fast
Criminals and thieves have to make decisions super fast.
If they don’t, they die.
Learn to speed up our decision making from criminals? That’s the idea!
Let’s look at a clever one.
Chemistry genius turned into a drug lord…
Enter Heisenberg aka Walter White.
In Breaking Bad S1E3, Walter has to make a big decision.
He must kill Krazy-8 (another bad guy) before his partner gets back.
The only problem: Walt has never killed a fly in his life.
Can he let indecision take over? No.
The stakes are too high.
But wait — how does Walt know the stakes? 🤨
If we know where the stakes are high, we can choose the right thing faster. Right?
Here’s the tool Walt uses to measure the stakes.
Walt uses a simple analysis technique called pro-con list. But…
Frames the headings as actions
Backs both decisions with values / reasons
Compares outcome scenarios
Evaluates the risk of not doing it
After this exercise, Walt gains new insight into both decisions.
He is able to…
Analyze where the stakes are high.
Spot what’s more important to him: morals or family.
For Walt, it’s family.
Hence, he is able to decide killing Krazy-8 is the best way forward.
What can we learn from Walt
Comparing outcome scenarios unearth new insights.
It reveals what’s truly important to us.
Let’s add one thing to Walt’s tool: long term effects.
For example, I’d also ask myself ‘what will I become in 5 years after making this decision?’
If Walt had asked this, he might have answered: a killer.
That might have increased the weight on letting Krazy-8 live.
But beware…
Use Walt’s method to speed up your decision making, not slow it down.
Don’t spend a whole year analyzing.
This analysis should only take 30 mindful minutes.
Don’t fall into the pit of overthinking or analysis paralysis.
End overthinking by accepting this reality 👇
More information will not provide certainty.
Instead, determine what you need to know.
Weigh the options. Get done with it.
Consider the cost of not making a decision.
Remind yourself what you may miss if you don’t decide
Think of the emotional turmoil you face by not acting
Use guilt and regret to your advantage
This will help you understand indecision isn’t worth it.
It will push you to make a decision quickly.
One common finding from Mark and Walt’s situation…
Deadlines make us decide faster.
Mark is a CEO, he can’t linger. He has to decide today.
Walt doesn’t have time too. He must kill Krazy 8 now.
That means, deadlines speed up our decision making.
If you are indecisive about something for a long time, try giving yourself a deadline.
Here’s a simple test 👇
Think and answer yourself: which line looks solid?
Should I go rock climbing or water surfing?
Decide before June 1st: rock climbing or water surfing.
If you ask me, the second line hits like a punch. It’s actionable.
The key is to assign a date, not a vague deadline.
And don’t stop there…
Hold your future self accountable.
Open Gmail and schedule a mail to yourself for Jun 1st.
Let it land your inbox in the morning.
The email should be as simple as:
‘Have you made the decision? If not, you have 12 hours to make it.’
This will put you in a state of urgency.
When in doubt, flip a coin.
Two reasons to do so:
Makes the decision for you
If the coin lands wrong, your reaction reveals what you truly want.
Learned this from clinical psychologist, Dr. Carla Manly. Thank her here.
One final reminder 👇
Indecision leads to missed opportunities and regrets.
Don't let it hold you back anymore.
That’s it for today!
I hope this letter helps you move the needle.
My goal was to help you think of decisions in a unique way.
Thank you for your time and trust to read this.
A small gift for curious ones…
Congrats on finishing up a long read. 👏 I appreciate it.
Enjoy these musical masterpieces to nail the weak ahead.
Rudiments Of A Spiritual Life - The American Dollar
Lovesick Blues (Stutz) - Mason Ramsey
Ezio’s Family (Live Concert Suite)
Today, we’ve explored a small part of decision making.
In future, we will dive deeper.
Here’s a recap for you
Automate small decisions.
Save fuel for making big ones.
Too many decisions a day exhaust you.
Compare outcomes to find new insights.
Deadlines make us decide faster.
Flip a coin to outsource decision making.
If you want to explore this further
Check out these great resources 👇
In this Medium post, Andy Dunn sheds light on ‘if we make decisions or decisions make us.’ Must read for hustlers.
In this life planning guide, Julian Shapiro teaches how to find the best bets. Must read if you struggle with ‘what to do in life.’
PsychCentral shares 4 tips to help you make decisions.
Until next week,
Hassaan
Nike has been right all long.
JUST DO IT !