Better Decision Making. Do I Deserve Better?

Well, we've looked at the head question and the first two parts of the heart question.  The thing that quite often holds us back is the last part of this heart question: Do I deserve better?  A lot of us seem to hold on to a hidden belief that we do not really deserve any better. Have you ever looked back and realized that you sabotaged something and you can't figure out why?

"Who do you think you are?"  How many of us heard that when we were growing up?  But that misses the point.  It is not that we deserve any better than anyone else - we all deserve better than what we are doing to ourselves - what we are getting right now, don't we?  We think we do.  But what do our actions show?  There is a continuum of thinking -- knowing -- believing.   It is very easy to say "I deserve better."  That is a head statement, a thinking statement.  Then we come to a point where we know on a deeper level that we really do deserve better, but we doubt we can have it.  Lastly comes a true belief that you really DO deserve better, and here we are willing to take actions toward that because we believe we can actually have it.

If you want to find out what you really believe, look at what you do.  Especially what you do over and over again.  I am sure we have all made decisions when we knew that we should get more information, but we didn't.  Why would we purposely do something that we knew would get less-than-desirable results?  Because deep down in our hearts we don't really believe we deserve that success.  We keep ourselves in our comfort zone.

So, if we realize we don't believe we really deserve better, what do we do?  Ask, "What would I do if I did deserve better?"  Then do it!   We don't need to wait until we believe it.  We just need to take action based on that better decision.  When our actions are better, things get better.  The belief will come.  

Now, a quick recap.  Ask the head question: "Am I meeting the real need, informing myself of options, and thinking it through?"  Then make the conditional decision.  Next, check in with your heart by asking: "Does my decision show I am honest with myself, trust my intuition, and deserve better?"  When we have asked the heart question, quite often we will realize that we have not been honest with ourselves or do not trust our intuition/heart.  Then we need to go back and re-make that head part of our decision.  This will lead us to a much better decision.

Our ability to make good decisions in all areas of our lives is critical to our success in business and in family life.  Make a small map of this decision making process and carry it with you or tack it on the wall by the computer/desk.  The results will amaze you!

Debby Riddick

http://DRiddick.bigmlmtruths.com

Decision Making - The Other Half

This is Part 3 of Decision Making, based upon Spencer Johnson’s book, "Yes" or "No." We have already looked at the “logical” side of decision-making. We have asked ourselves "Am I meeting the Real Need, Informing Myself of Options, and Thinking It Through?" We can review our past decisions to see how we went about making those decisions and what the results were, good and bad. The point is to learn from the past without beating ourselves up about how those decisions turned out. We did the best we could do at the time.

Now, let’s move on to the other side of the process of decision-making. We will make even better decisions when we learn to look into our heart for confirmation after we have asked the head questions. Most people make their decisions emotionally and then look for logical reasons to justify the decision they already made. It works better when we involve the feelings and the head simultaneously.  The second set of questions is: “Does My Decision Show I Am Honest with Myself, Trust My Intuition, and Deserve Better?”  

We need to make decisions in integrity, that is, telling ourselves the truth. The consequences, down the road,  of a decision which is based in illusion will generally be much harder to deal with than dealing with the illusion now. We need to ask ourselves what are our beliefs about (1) our integrity, (2) our intuition, and (3) our insight into our own worth.  The more aware we are of our own character, the more often we make better decisions. We will only use those portions of our character we think have real value for us in making our decisions, so our decisions depend on how we view our character and they also reveal our character.

One way of finding the truth is by identifying the illusion, or fiction, we would rather believe and then looking for it’s opposite. If we can’t see the illusion our friends and family can help us see it if we can get our ego out of the way. Our challenge is to discover the truth; once we see the truth the decision is obvious.  

How do we learn to trust our intuition? Our intuition is our unconscious knowledge based on our personal experience and our “gut” reactions to events in the moment. Again, look back at decisions we made in the past and see how we felt at the time we were making them. Did we force the issue? Did we feel anxious or enthusiastic? Did it feel clear or confused? Did we feel stressed or peaceful? How did those decisions work out?  

Most of the negative fear responses freeze us. We then force a decision that we are not happy with because we are afraid.  We need to ask “What would I do if I were not afraid?”  Feeling the fear is okay, but we need to learn to acknowledge it, see where it comes from and then move ahead with the decision that is not fear based.  Decisions made with enthusiasm tend to have a better outcome that those made in fear. If the decision doesn’t feel right, it probably isn’t. Our intuition is working; we just need to pay better attention to it.

Next week we will cover the last part of this question: Does my decision show I deserve better? Now there’s a can of worms.

Debby Riddick

http://DRiddick.bigmlmtruths.com

Decision Making - What is The Real Need ?

Last time, from Spencer Johnson’s book Yes or No, we learned that we need to use both our head and our heart to make the best decisions. We use our head by asking the first question: “Am I meeting the real need, informing myself of options and thinking it through?” We must answer either “yes” or “no” to the question. No “maybes.”

If the answer is “no” we keep going. We ask: “Is this something I merely want?” or “Is this something I really need?” We may want a Ferrari, but what we really need is a car to get to work. We have to make the decision based on the real need. We can go back and work on what we want later.

We need to focus on the results in such detail that we can actually see ourselves at the point where we have achieved them. This focus helps us say no to everything else until it is achieved. Once we have made this decision, the daily choices are easy. Does this action help me achieve my goal, my real need, or not? If the answer is no, then we don’t do it.

Spencer Johnson gives us a great way to separate the needs and wants: To see what we merely want, we ask “What do I wish I could do?” To see what we really need we ask “What would I like to have done?” looking back on it from the future.

Once we have done that, we need to be sure that we are looking at all the options. When we think we don’t have any options we need to remember that we just aren’t aware of them right now. We need to gather information, but only what is actually needed to make the decision. It is too easy to get buried in facts that don’t focus on the need. They just distract us. We need to gather information and then validate it for ourselves.

When we feel frozen with fear we need to just get started. Ask “If I don’t have the information, who does?” “What is the best way to get it?” “Have I verified it myself?” That will lead to more information and so on. Pretty soon we are able to see that there are choices we weren’t even aware of.

The last step in this part of the process is thinking it through. We can start by looking at our past decisions and learning from them. When we got bad results what had we done wrong in making the decision? When we got good results what had we done right in making the decision?

We can improve our future results by asking “then what? … then what? … then what?” for each of the options we are looking at. We often make the mistake of assuming that it is only a short-term decision, but quite often there are long-term repercussions. So carry each option out to the future.


Stay tuned for the next installment, Feelings.

Debby Riddick

http://DRiddick.bigmlmtruths.com

Making Better Decisions

For the next couple of weeks I want to share some thoughts from a book that has been a great help to me, Yes or No by Spencer Johnson. This is a book that teaches us a method for making consistently better decisions. Where we are in life is largely the result of decisions we have made, or not made. Johnson has discovered a pretty foolproof system for knowing how to "say ‘Yes’ to what works well for each of us and ‘No’ to what doesn’t.”

Our poor decisions cause problems in all areas of our lives – with our families, our finances, and our work. The act of putting off a decision because we are afraid of making a mistake is a decision in and of itself. We don’t have to make perfect decisions; we just need to make better decisions. A better decision is one where we feel better about how we made the decision and we get better results.

Most people have heard the axiom that the definition of insanity is continuing to do the same thing over and over and expecting different results. If we don’t know what to do, the first step is to stop what we are doing right now. We need to stop the behavior, based on the poor decision, which has become familiar and comfortable, even though it is not working for us, and create a void so that we can fill it with something better. As long as we are busy acting in the old way, the better way will not present itself.

So step one is to stop doing what we are currently doing and ask ourselves some questions. We need to make our initial decision in our normal way and then ask a cool head question and a warm heart question. Most of use one or the other, but better decisions are made when we take advantage of all the faculties we have. For example, use your logical mind to figure out what makes sense and then ask your heart how you feel about that; check in with some other folks in your Mastermind group; make the decision and act on it.

By using this system every time for every decision we will make better decisions overall. It doesn’t mean that we will never make a mistake, but it does mean that we will make more good decisions. As we perfect this process those decisions will get better and better.

Stay tuned for the next installment, The Real Need

Debby Riddick

http://DRiddick.bigmlmtruths.com