Decision-making

Today I feel like writing something about decision-making so here we go!

I thought I would share a couple things I have learned along the way, social psychology courses mostly, that everybody should realize about decision-making. A few years ago I took a brilliant class on decision-making and the whole class focused around "gut decisions." People describe these as a moment where you feel something deep inside that says you should do something about it right now. But there's actually more to that gut feeling than you think. In simple terms, it's telling you that you're picking up on something.

Let me give you an example: one of the stories I read during this course was of a fire chief who was interviewed minutes after he instructed all of his firefighters to vacate the roof of a burning building immediately. Seconds later the roof collapsed. Every one of the firefighters would have dropped several floors and likely died. Instead everybody was off the roof safely before it happened. When asked why he decided to get them off the roof he simply stated "I had a gut feeling something was wrong." They've done some research on this topic and found some pretty interesting stuff. Essentially, research has found that the reason that he got a gut feeling was because something wasn't exactly right. Being a fire chief, he had several years in the field so subconsciously he felt that the roof was a little weaker than it normally feels and maybe the flames were up higher than they normally would be on a safe roof thus compromising the roof. So in actuality, it was his expertise giving him the gut feeling.

The point I'm trying to make is that trusting your gut really isn't that crazy. You might not be able to explain it in anyway but "I have a gut feeling" but sometimes those gut feelings could be you sensing something as an "expert" on the subject, whatever that might be. I mean expert in the broad sense that you've had a lot of experience with something. So if you sense a little gut feeling that something isn't exactly right or something is better than it should be trust it. Small short-term decisions that won't harm anything, especially if you have experience with what you're dealing with, is pretty safe to trust. It can't hurt. If it's a big decisions that do have some consequences, you might want to do a little research into what your gut is telling you.

For example, lets say you're a seasoned vet in the stock market and you're scoping the market and you make a bet that a company that you've been following is going to take off, watch it, don't invest, just watch it for a little while anyways. If your prediction starts to come to fruition do some research into what "your gut" is telling you and find out what's different about that company that you maybe noticed somewhere in your psyche but haven't brought it to conscious thought. Or perhaps you're playing a sport that you've played several times (lets say hockey for simplicity) and you get a gut feeling that a play is going to develop in a certain manner so you should move to the other side of the ice even though typically you wouldn't do so. Give it a try a couple times and see what happens. They always say that Gretzky could read the play well ahead of others. That's most definitely true and I'm guessing he used his "gut" to pick up on the way plays were developing.

Try it out a little. If you're a timid person and rarely trust your instinct or gut and end up on the losing end of the stick often, try trusting yourself and what you're feeling.

Keeping the decision-making ball rolling I wanted to share one more fun piece of information that I learned in my schooling that really struck a cord with me when I read about it: flipping a coin. Flipping a coin is a easy and fair way to decide an initial advantage for two separate teams (like the NFL coin toss) but it's also a great way to force yourself to make a decision. Lets say you are deciding between two job offers. One is in the current city you live in and the other is halfway across the country and each job has pros and cons and you don't know which one to choose. Flip a coin. If you flip a coin and it lands on the job in your current city and you feel no hesitation about saying "yeah that sounds good, I'm ok with that decision" then you have nothing to worry about. Take the job. What if the coin lands on the other job. Now you start thinking "oh boy ok I guess I'm moving and taking the new job. I really don't know how I feel about this". If you really start to feel uneasy about the way that coin dropped and you feel like doing a redo or a best of three just to make sure, your gut is telling you something again. Take the job in your current city. You clearly are leaning stronger to that side. You don't have to take the option that the coin gives you but it might help you see where your heart is. It works with complex and simple decisions. Take another example: choosing between two restaurants because you don't know what you feel like for instance. Flip a coin and see if you feel any resistance with the choice the coin gives you. If so then choose the other place. It's something I'll probably remember for the rest of my life and has already helped me navigate simple and complex decisions.

Happy New Years, folks! Lets make it a good one and trust our instincts a little more.

Optimism

So, being a psychology major, you hear a million times that depressed individuals have a very realistic view of the world (one that is bleak and ultimately leads one to be more depressed) where as everybody else is way too optimistic. But keep on keepin' on with the optimism. For one it makes you happier to think of things that could be so why not. Also, being successful in life is essentially all luck. I mean you could argue that it's working hard and proving yourself. However, working hard to me means to keep optimistic and keep on trying things until something works. Let me give you an example...

In "Pursuit of Happyness" the character played by Will Smith is trying to get an internship with a brokerage. He keeps trying to talk to the individual in charge of hiring and is continually blown off. He keeps on trying and trying. Eventually, he's able to do something to impress the guy(in this particular case, he solves a Rubik's cube). He gets the internship and eventually gets a job with brokerage. I know this is a movie and probably exaggerated but the message is what I'm getting at. He kept trying, he kept his optimism high even though if he was thinking of it logically there was no way the guy should have even considered him (he had no experience or education pertaining to the position and did not have the network of connections to get his foot in the door). If he was realistic about it then nothing would have happened and it would have been a very boring and depressing movie. But he had that unrealistic and over optimistic view of how things could be.

Keep optimistic about things. Take some risks (not ones that will land you in jail or completely ruin your life) but things where there's really no harm if you fail (ask that person out that you've never talked to and see once every few months ... why wouldn't you, there is absolutely no harm except the mild heart attack you get from thinking about it each time you see that person ... push past it). This is especially if you are young. Before you get shackled down with mouths to feed and a mortgage to pay make some risky decisions. Odds are they probably won't work out but what if, by chance, something does? The world is a scary place, if you can keep your optimism and keep trying things then never let it stop!

Money Makes The World Go Round

So I was thinking to myself, can you be super happy if you work the job of your dreams? Is that all you ever need? Probably not. I worked a couple great summer jobs that let me play guitar all day, drive around in a golf cart/motor boat and watch movies for 80% of the working day. A great gig. I could surely work that year round .... while making less than $ 20,000 a year. Would I do that now? Not a chance. I've had a taste of the big pay cheque (in a relative sense) and I think it would be impossible to go back. Not that my current job is a nightmare or anything, actually quite enjoyable most days. However, even if offered the opportunity to have to "job of my dreams" the monetary compensation would play an enormous factor. To think of all the things I would have to give up, all the non-work related activities, to hold on to this job. The trade-off probably wouldn't be worth it. How do you find that equal medium? If your job, like mine, is good most days do you just ride that wave. Of course not, we always have to find something better. Simply by making little lateral or slight hierarchical steps you probably end up missing out on a lot other activities that also made your life great and happy (i.e., free time, time with the people you most want to spend time with, hobbies). If you've got a good thing going maybe it's time to sit back and realize it and enjoy it, things are probably pretty good.

Time is on your side

Time. As you get older you seem to have less and less of it, that's what people say. Funny thing is you probably have much more time then you think. For instance, I feel like I don't have enough time to get as much done as I want to in a day. I would like to make it to the gym 4 times a week, but I "can't find the time." Yet I have the time to write this blog right now, time that I just found out of nowhere because I was motivated to write this. At this very moment. And I was going to make it happen even if I "didn't have the time." But I almost guarantee I won't make it to those 4 workouts this week, I haven't made it to one in about 8 months. I will, however, somehow find the time to waste in front of the tv tonight when I get home or play a tune on the guitar I've played a million times because I can always find the time for that. The point is you've got the time ... stop reading over a report a 1000 times to make sure there's no mistakes. Especially if it's not all that important. Stop wasting time meandering around useless websites for 10 minutes here and 20 minutes there and looking over stuff you've looked over before. The worst thing you could do is sit in front of the tv and watch re-runs. You've already seen all that that episode had to offer and, even if it's not your favorite, you'll watch it again for "something to do." Coming back to motivation (see past blog!). How can we motivate ourselves to "find the time"? Something has got to trigger you into putting that at a priority that you must make time for. People stray away from doing big big things that can benefit them because these things take too much time so you can never get to it. Chip away at it .... make the time because I GUARANTEE it's there if you want to make it.

Motivation and Success

Motivation .... what provokes it? What's motivating me to write this right now, who knows?! What motivates people to become successful and achieve everything they ever wanted to? Only a very, very small percentage of people actually do remain this motivated too but it does happen. Some suggest it's by setting small and clear goals for yourself. But setbacks are all around and some people can just thrive past anything. Craziest part is they don't even know if they're going to get to where they want to be, but they keep on going like they will. You never know what's going to happen. So is it just taking a huge leap and just hoping like hell that you end up somewhere near that landing pad you were gunning for? Seems like it. Maybe you need to be a lot eccentric to be motivated. And that never say die attitude is where the success comes from. That being said, caution is the norm in society which is just plain backwards. Why are people fearful of suggesting something or going for something they want? Because they don't want to jump! I guess they're not motivated enough. Know this: if you're too cautious or even moderately cautious with big decisions then you'll be disappointed at the end of the journey.

Make it happen

Forget about coming up with the "next original idea" because it already exists. It's about harnessing that idea into something profitable and long lasting. If you're a certified accountant looking to start up your own accounting firm or a mechanic looking to open your own shop or any other type of aspiring entrepreneur, you've got to learn a thing or two about marketing and networking or you won't survive ... in any field. If you think the quality of your work alone will speak for itself then you'll be up that infamous stream with nothing but bankruptcy and debt in less than a year. Everything already exists and the reason you might not know that something exists is two fold. On one side, the idea isn't worth trying to make something out of, simple as that. On the other hand, it could be that the marketing is not at all substantial enough or it's not geared to the demographic that is to be attracted to this product or service. If you've got that next idea then prove it and make it happen. Do your research, get a focused marketing campaign that will help the company grow because nobody's going to throw you a paddle once you commit to that ship.