The 3 Things to Consider Before Making a Decision
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“If only I had clarity, I know I have what it takes to accomplish any goal!”
“If only I had the courage to pursue my dreams… but, alas, I’m just not brave!”
“If I just had the confidence to try… write… build… say… (choose your verb), I know I would succeed!”
These are words I hear often from my clients, regardless of age or background. They express the universal desire for the three “C’s”—Clarity, Courage, and Confidence—that so many people hope to gain from Professional Coaching.
But let me share a dirty little secret of coaching. The challenges we think we are facing due to a lack of clarity, courage, or confidence—are rarely the root of the problem!
Many of us, especially young people, believe there’s always a clear right or wrong choice regarding decisions. This applies to everything—from small choices like what to eat or wear to more significant decisions like discovering our purpose or following our passions. We believe that if we just had more clarity, courage, and confidence, we’d effortlessly make the “right” decision.
Is it any wonder that the most consistent complaint among those seeking coaching is that they feel stuck, frozen, or lost? When we feel incapable of making the “right” decision, we don’t make any—and suffer the emotional consequences.
The compliment I hear the most when coaching and advising my clients is, “You’re so wise.” I accept it graciously, though a part of me—the little girl within—can’t help but laugh at being described as “wise.”
For most of my life, I was called bold, audacious, ambitious, hard-working, adventurous, courageous, confident, funny, and even a little crazy. But wise? That is not a description of me I’d heard before—at least, not until the last decade of my life.
But it became easier for me to accept this compliment when I understood that wisdom, put simply, is nothing more than anticipating the consequences of our choices.
Being wise doesn’t mean I’m smarter or, by any measure, better than the next person. It means I am committed to and continue to do the work of slowing down, to look at three things before making any decision:
- The trade-off
- The opportunity cost
- The second-order consequences
Let me explain.
A trade-off is what we pay to play. It’s the fee inherent in any choice we make and has nothing to do with whether that choice is right or wrong. If I choose to drink wine with dinner for a special occasion (I’m not a drinker), the trade-off is a less-than-ideal night of sleep. A trade-off is a feature, not a bug, in the decision-making system. Many people have yet to accept this truth and spend their hours, days, and lives looking for decisions that require nothing to be given up in return.
An opportunity cost is what we don’t get to do, have, or create if we make a specific choice. This tendency often shows up when I work with people who are used to people-pleasing. They love to say “yes” without slowing down to think about what they are automatically saying “no” to by making that choice. We are ALWAYS giving up one opportunity when we say yes to another. The fact that most people don’t understand this concept doesn’t make it any less true.
Second-order consequences are the indirect and often unforeseen results that occur once we make any decision. Earlier in my life, this was my most damaging blind spot, and I confess that I made life harder for myself than it needed to be. Second-order consequences can be minimized simply by asking ourselves, “Then what?”
Last week, at a dinner party, the host asked me, “What makes you qualified to coach others?” It’s a good and fair question. I appreciated his boldness and honesty. I answered, “I know how to help people become wiser.”
Behaving wisely is not magical and isn’t necessarily earned with age (as most people assume). It’s a practice, not a personality trait. And we are never too old or, for that matter, too young to become wise.
