What Is The Best Way To Make a Big Decision

Western business culture stresses thinking and analysis for nearly all aspects of work. These days, you may read about leaders going with the gut or intuiting it, but what that means is rarely clarified. In fact, it comes off as nothing more than a courageous gamble that’s a winner. Here, we’re talking about big decisions and tough decisions: complex, important, and confounding ones. Those where you’ve got to get it right. For decision-making that involves big decisions, you need to do more than think. Here are 10 alternative ways to expand your perspective, draw in original ideas and information, be more innovative, and make the best decision.

When Thinking About It Doesn’t Work

You’ve probably had an experience where no matter how much you mulled a decision over in your mind, a clear answer just didn’t come to mind. Maybe this unproductive thought process derailed, then ran in circles, and finally settled into hopeless rumination.

The sense of futility could have even worked up stress and anxiety. Then, your focus might have narrowed further accelerating the mental cycling. A looming deadline and/or an intolerant supervisor may have exacerbated this situation. Thinking and then thinking more and more did not serve you well when you faced tough decision-making.

Most people don’t realize but the analytical, thinking mind trolls through all the old mental files of past experiences and solutions and chooses the option with the best potential outcome for the current situation. To find a novel and even brilliant solution you have to step away from your mental file cabinet and inject something new.

10 Non-Analytical Methods That Generate Creative, Novel, And Authentic Ideas

These 10 methods support better decision-making because they open your focus, cultivate different perspectives, help you tap into that right-brain creative problem-solving capacities and embodied cognition, embodied wisdom, and collectively encourage you to cross-fertilize ideas and options in ways that lead to new innovative solutions.

While not every method listed here works completely without engaging your thinking mind, where they do, it’s in an open and curious way.

1. Seek ideas and suggestions from trusted mentors, colleagues, and friends. They know you and can often suggest something that’s not only novel but inclined to suit you.
2. Request ideas and suggestions from at least one person with whom you typically disagree. This can stretch your thinking and catch faulty reasoning. However, you have to stay open and curious and, therefore, amenable to the valuable nuggets of your regular rival.
3. Get input from others who may be affected by your decision. Not only will you be able to avoid some unintended harm and future conflict, but these people may also offer useful solutions.
4. Check what your heart says or in other words listen to your heart-brain.
5. Journal or write about each choice, writing whatever comes to mind for at least five minutes.
6. Meditate on the choices or questions related to the decision or options.
7. Work with and explore metaphor methods. This helps you tap into your subconscious and the creative part of your brain.
8. Experiment with blending your options to create a workable compromise and perhaps a superior choice.
9. Listen inside yourself or in other words listen to your gut and embodied mind. or
10. If you’re proficient at working with your intuition, listen to it.

Which Decision-Making Method Is Best?

None of these methods is the best for everyone and in every situation. The key is to diversify your methods and sources of information such that you stimulate creative, original, and authentic ideas. For this, you need a blend of methods.

A good practice is to start with non-analytical and more exploratory approaches. Open and creative thinking can sometimes dampen stressful thinking. Then, you turn to analysis and consideration of constraints once calmer.

Allow yourself to look at all the input together in no particular order. You want to identify new relationships among the information and evoke new perspectives.

Learning to sense within yourself. Your embodied wisdom will give you the whole sense and assessment of your choices.

Then, if you feel the need to analyze all the information and impressions you gathered, conduct your cost-benefit or other analytical assessment.

For Assistance with Tough Decision-Making, See:

• Blog posts:
  • Embodied Cognition| What Will Make You Smarter
  • How Your Embodied Mind Shapes Your Life,
  • Do You Really Want To Quit Your Job: Here’s How To Know For Sure;
• Staff Development virtual and in-person workshops, and, in particular:
  • Tap Into Your Inner Wisdom To Access Full Intelligence;
• Integrated Workplace Coaching,