Are you faced with a situation where you need to make a decision?
It could be as simple as what to make for dinner or it be something a bit more substantial like:
- Have you been thinking about leaving a relationship but aren’t sure what the right move is?
- How about changing careers or your job?
- Unsure if you should be more or less aggressive with a non-responsive client?
- What about if you should charge more or at all for a service you offer?
- What should you order for lunch - the salad or the hot pasta special?
- Contemplating if joining the gym would be a good use of your money and time?
- What about attending that seminar your friend told you about?
If you are being faced with similar situations and cringe at the thought of not making the right decision, then what you’re about to learn will change your life – mine did.
What if yours could too!? Below are 3 insights and tools that you can apply immediately with the very next decision you need to make!
- Recognize the difference between decision and choice
The very first thing that changed for me was to realize that ‘decisions’ are actually limitations in and of themselves.
Decisions cut off all other choices and possibilities that are available to you that could create something greater.
Decisions also often involve a judgment of some kind around what is right or wrong/good or bad/better or worse...as though any of those actually exist.
They don't. Any variation of ‘right and wrong’ are just perpetuations of judgment that create and perpetuate polarization and even more judgment of yourself and/or others.
This becomes the case even more when you believe that “you need to stand by whatever you decide”.
And when you look at the etymology behind the word ‘decision’ you can see how it’s origins perpetuate polarity, judgment, conclusion, and limitation.
In fact the words that Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913 + 1828) uses to define ‘decision’ are: “…cutting off; division; the act of settling or terminating, as a controversy, by giving judgment on the matter at issue; settlement; conclusion.”
If we look at the etymology of the word ‘choice’, we find a very different set of words: “The determination of the mind in preferring one thing to another; option; election; care in selecting; a sufficient number to choose among.”
If you tap into the energy of both sets of words, you may notice that the set for ‘decision’ feels much more closed ended while the ones around choice are much more open ended.
So my first invitation for you is to begin to rather see all the decisions as choices you have available.
- Don’t follow the herd
Now let’s take a look at the most common strategies that people use to make their ‘decisions’ which also could be limiting you:
:: Consulting your significant other :: Inviting a friend for coffee to weigh up your options :: Writing a pros and cons list :: Considering the budget :: Doing a Google search for reviews, insight, info on what others did :: Thinking about the opinions of your friends, family, colleagues etc. :: Watching a TV show (Dr. Oz, Dr. Phil, etc.) :: Consulting your doctor or health professional
Do you happen to notice anything about the list?
If you read through it one more time, you might recognize that every single one of these strategies either requires you to go outside of yourself for an ‘answer’ and/or it contains a judgment about what is right and wrong/better and worse?
Can you see how many conflicting points of view that could generate?
So here’s what you can do instead: If you recognize that whatever anyone thinks – including yourself – is just an interesting point of view – then you will create the space to know what’s true for you.
If you buy into all the points of views that you and everyone else have – then you’ll experience conflict (because all those points of view often do contradict each other) and will continue to have the feeling of ‘not knowing what to choose’.
- Go shopping for the energy
Not knowing what to choose is often a result of not knowing what you’d actually like to create in and as your life.
To what extent have you lived your life by the advice, considerations, projections and expectations of others – family, parents, teachers, friends, society, etc.?
If it’s a lot, then you may need to go ‘shopping the energy’.
How much fun could that be?
Imagine going to the Universe Outlet stores, of which there are infinite possibilities of what you can buy and to top it off, everything is FREE!
What would you like to purchase and bring home?
Now please don’t mistake this for ‘things’. The topic isn’t ‘going shopping for stuff’! It’s all about the energy of all that.
So if a Ferrari was on your list, what energy would having it, provide you with? That’s what you want to bring home.
Why? Because if you make it about the energy, rather the thing, you can receive the energy of everything else that matches that energy! How cool is that?
But if you have any expectations, projections, decisions, conclusions, or judgments about Ferrari’s being ‘the best’ and nothing comparing to them, then you really can’t receive anything greater because you’ve defined and stopped the energy.
It doesn’t matter how big or small your choices are, who they involve, or what they’re about, the minute you attach any expectations, projections, conclusions, or computations, about how it should show up, will show up, etc. you’ve limited the whole thing and can’t receive how else it can show up, that might be even easier, more fun, etc. than your own version.
Shopping for the energy allows the Universe to deliver gifts and packages to you in ways that you weren’t expecting, couldn’t have imagined, etc. if you stop all your expectations, projections, conclusions, and judgments about how and what form it has to show up in.
- Follow your light
Once you have a greater sense of the energies you’d like to have in your life, then you can start asking the questions that will provide you with either a match to that energy or not.
And that’s how you begin to operate from your own knowing about what choice will create the life you truly desire.
An example is “What will my life be like in the next 5 years if I do x?”
“What will my life be like in the next 5 years if I don’t?”
Whichever feels lightest to you, is the choice that matches the energy of what you shopped for.
And there you have it. A very different way of operating in the world, but what if it was one that will give you everything you truly desire and a greater sense of ease when faced with any…choice?