Episode 160: Successfully Navigating Decision Fatigue, COVID, and the Holidays
In this episode, I talk with Michelle Florendo, Decision Engineer and Coach about making the holiday decision-making process as easy as possible (or at least a little bit easier).
As if navigating the holidays wasn’t already hard enough, 2020 has turned our holiday traditions on their head.
In my family, we’re making some tough decisions about the holidays, and emotions are running high. We’ve already canceled our traditional Thanksgiving trip to Chicago to visit my aunt, uncle, and cousins—and it looks like we’ll need to reimagine our Christmas as well, which has been pretty much the same my whole life.
Making decisions this year has been hard. I’m sure you feel it, too. Do we have a holiday celebration with family? Do we travel? Do we stay home and have a virtual get-together? Do we need to change how we do things at all? It’s tough and the decision fatigue is real.
In a quest to make the holiday decision-making process as easy as possible (or at least a little bit easier), I wanted to talk with Decision Engineer and Coach, Michelle Florendo.
Michelle specializes in helping people untangle messy decisions in life and work. After studying decision engineering at Stanford University, she spent the past 15 years helping hundreds of professionals use the principles of decision engineering to make decisions with less stress and more clarity.
Listen to the full episode to find out:
How we make decisions
How decision fatigue is a thing more than ever this year and how to deal with it to make life a little easier
Tips on dealing with all the emotions that come up around COVID and the holidays
Ways to navigate the constantly changing information we’re getting around COVID
Why it’s important to honor the feelings that keep coming up and treating them as data
Resources mentioned:
+ Read the Transcript
Michelle: I think that the pandemic has definitely produced decision fatigue for a number of different reasons. One, because it's created so many more decisions that we feel like we need to really think through, but also it's taken away some of our. Outlets, like you said that help us build back our capacity.
That help us refuel.
Nancy: Singing “It's the holiday season.” Oh, a little too early. Ah, actually with the disaster that has been 2020, it isn't to early. As if navigating the holidays, wasn't hard enough. This year COVID has turned our holidays on their heads with the recent uptick in COVID cases, hospitalizations and deaths.
This year, we are going to be making some tough decisions about the holidays and emotions are running high. You're listening to the happier approach, the show that pulls back the curtain on the need to succeed, hustle, and achieve at the price of our inner peace in relationships. I'm your host, Nancy Jane Smith.
I know in our family, we've already canceled our traditional Thanksgiving trip to Chicago to visit my aunt and uncle and cousins. And it looks like we're going to be, re-imagined getting our Christmas as well, which has stayed the same for most of my life. So in a quest to make the holiday decision-making process, as easy as possible, I learned at the talk with the decision engineer and coach Michelle Florenda.
Michelle breaks it down for us. So keep listening to hear how we actually make decisions. How decision fatigue is a thing this year, more than ever, and how to deal with it. The steps for making decisions and tips on dealing with all the emotions that come up around COVID and the holidays, how to deal with the constantly changing information we're getting around COVID and ways to reduce decision fatigue and make life a little easier.
Michelle Florenda is here to talk to us about decision-making. And I think before we started talking, I meant to write it down. You talked about how there was an engineering of efficiency. That just makes my little high functioning anxiety, heart go. Pitter-patter pitter-patter so tell me, Michelle, how did you get involved in The science of decision-making.
Michelle: So it was one of those things that I just stumbled on. Actually, I'm thinking about how far back I should go for this story. I might just start at the beginning. So when I grew up, all I wanted to be was a teacher. To be honest in the first grade, I wanted to be a first grade teacher, second grade.
I wanted to be a second grade teacher. And so on until I had a teacher who was really fantastic, but she heard me say this and she told me it would be a waste of my brain. And then I went home and cried. I think now. Understanding a little bit more about how we don't compensate our teachers enough. I think I know where that sentiment was coming from.
She was a young teacher, but she was excellent, but not getting paid her worth. But I remember at that moment I went home. I cried. I thought, what am I going to do if I'm not going to be a teacher? And I was good at math and science. And so I decided I'm going to be an editor. Yeah again, like back in the day, I didn't know of all the different options.
So I did some research and I was learning about all the different engineering disciplines. And I heard about industrial engineering, which someone told me was the engineering of efficiency, which totally. It made me get really excited because I thought that was really neat and fascinating. And then once I got into school, I studied at Stanford and they had reconfigured their industrial engineering department to merge with a few other departments.
And I found out that one of the options that I could choose to study was decision engine. Which I thought was fascinating. Wow, I can optimize decisions. How come we've never been taught this before. So that's how I landed in the decision making space.
Nancy: This is awesome. Okay. So we're getting ready for Thanksgiving and the holidays and all signs point towards COVID is still here.
It's still here and growing. Yeah. Coming down the pike is decisions about holidays, which is why I wanted you to be here to talk us through how to make a decision about the holidays. But before we get into that, I want to talk about decision fatigue. And I think a lot of us are experiencing that with COVID and 2020 in general, it's just been a really tough year.
But I know decision fatigue happens well beyond. Just this year. So tell me about decision fatigue. What is it, why is it happening?
Michelle: So I find it useful to break down. What's actually happening in our brains because sometimes people will reach out and say, is it just me or is my brain no longer working for some shape or reason?
And it's not just, it's not just them. It's not just you, not just me to
Nancy: That’s good to know just there is good to know.
Michelle: What happens is that so I'm going to draw a little bit on the work of Daniel Kahneman and his book thinking fast and slow. And so one of the key concepts from his book is that we have these two systems of thinking, thinking fast is the intuitive, super fast, sometimes emotional almost reactionary brain or a part of our brain.
Some people call it the lizard brain, but it operates. Quickly. And then there's the thinking slow. This is the it, our prefrontal cortex, our executive function, where we are analyzing things with logic and weighing all of the outcomes. That's our thinking slow part of the brain. He calls them system one system two.
I'll just call them thinking fast, thinking slow. Okay. For shorthand. And the thing is there's a lot of psychological research that's been done that shows. The capacity we have for that slow thinking is finite. So we only have a finite reservoir of energy to use with these slow thinking decisions. And that's why, if you have to do many hours of logical analytical thinking by the end of it, your brain feels a little bit fried.
And so what I seen, especially this year is a few things. So one especially in the midst of the pandemic, there are a lot of decisions that used to be just everyday decisions like, oh, do I go see my parents so that they can see their grandkids? Or do I get on a plane? Do I go to the grocery store?
Especially like really early on all of these normally mundane decisions become a little more high stakes. Because of the possible health implications. And so I'm seeing a lot more people taking those decisions and putting them in the, oh, I must think slope about it. And so now we have more decisions that we are trying to use our slow thinking around.
And then also, because there's still a bit of uncertainty because our human brains don't like. Uncertainty. We think that we, oh we really need to be sure. I need to think even harder about these decisions to make sure I make the right decision. And so what we're seeing is almost like an overload of our slow thinking part of our brain.
And that's where the decision fatigue comes from. If you think about it being almost like a fuel tank, but we're running on it.
Nancy: Yeah, I can totally relate to that. And then, because there isn't really any certainty, like certainty cannot be found in the sense of there's so many conflicting messages coming at us and different parts of the country have different experiences with COVID.
It's hard to find the guidance to have certainty. Is that's is that what you're meaning by certainty? Is that upping the ante even more?
Michelle: Yes. When I think about certainty and our need for certainty, there's a couple of different things. One it's harder to come by certainty for all of the reasons that you just mentioned that the data that's out there it differs by geographical location.
Also differs every day, after. Big holidays in the summer, we saw spikes. And the data that was valid two weeks ago may not be the same as the data we have now. So there's this ever-changing dynamic aspect of information that is producing some uncertainty, but also there's the piece around I was actually talking to Barry Schwartz.
Who's the author of the paradox of choice a couple months ago about this. And he said, I think another thing that people don't realize is that. Our tolerance for uncertainty has also diminished over time, not even just this year, but as a society. And so if you think about the way that technology has been able to, give us instant answers, if we can Google things, we don't have to wait or Netflix, we don't have to wait an entire week to figure out what happened after that cliffhanger of an episode.
Technology has actually reduced our tolerance for uncertainty over time as has our societal I guess hunger for certainty. Like I think in, at least in the U S there is a bias towards, you must know, and we must know it's certainty
Nancy: and it must not change. It must stay the course, because if it changes, that means it's uncertain.
Yeah. That's interesting. Because I can Google right away. What's the capital of Florida, rather than having to not know, because I just don't know. Then I'm less comfortable with uncertainty because I get it instantaneously now. Okay.
Michelle: So there's this bias towards knowing and knowing instantaneously has hindered our capacity to just be with the not knowing.
Nancy: Okay. That is interesting. Because something we get really caught up in is a little bit of certainty, but it's more so the right, this is the right way. And I know it's the right way because I can get enough information to feed that I know it's the right way because I'm following what everyone else is doing.
So it's not so much certainty, but it's a form of that. And so what is so hard right now is there is no right way. So everyone has a different opinion. I can talk to five different family members and they all feel very differently about COVID. If it's from, it's not real to, oh my gosh, we shouldn't be even going to the grocery store.
And so finding that level of right is hard right. And taking in the information and being able to figure out what's accurate is hard. Even more so now, because as you said, I hadn't even thought about that. Just the amount of decisions we've had to make using the slow brain and all this stuff we take for granted is gone, childcare and schooling, and it's all freaking out the window. And this has nothing to do with decision-making, but also being able to be in the car, on your drive, home from work and listen to the radio, getting those regular outlets where your brain can just. Not beyond that isn't happening either.
Michelle: Yeah. Yeah. I think that the pandemic has definitely produced decision fatigue for a number of different reasons. One, because it's created so many more decisions that we feel like we need to really think through, but also it's taken away some of our. Outlets, like you said that help us build back our capacity, help us refuel.
Nancy: So here we are right before the holidays, it's coming down. What are we going to do? We've canceled our holiday plans already. And even our plan B is under. Question, how do we start this process of making these really tough decisions about the holidays?
Michelle: Yeah. Yeah.
Oh, I remember. I feel like I've had a lot of conversations with people about how is it that you make decisions?
Not only in the pandemic, but in, in general. So I want to start at a very basic level because I think it's very useful for people to think about decisions in this way. And that's every decision. Has three parts. There are three components that this is like the same thing that professor Ron Howard would teach at Stanford.
So every single decision has three parts. One is what are the objectives? What are the things that matter in the outcome? The second component of any decision is what are your options? What are the different courses or paths that you can choose a mountain? And then the third piece of any decision is what information do you have?
On how each of those options might deliver against your objectives. And then also in the information piece is, what information do you not have? Is there anything you can necessarily do with about that? And as people are making decisions, especially about the holidays, it's useful to start actually with what the objectives are.
I think sometimes it can get. Really easy to assume certain objectives that matter just, according to society. And so I think health being able to preserve one's own health and the health of their loved ones tends to be an objective. Not being responsible for spreading the virus also tends to be an objective, but it is also useful to identify what are the other objectives at play because when we only focus on.
Those two things, the health things, we may forget that there are other things that might be impacted by our decision. Earlier on in the pandemic, I was talking to a number of parents about decision-making and on one hand, They realized that, trying to manage the risk of getting COVID, at least for them had a negative impact on other objectives.
They had okay, the decisions around childcare, have negative implications for how they could advance in their career or even just their own mental health or their relationship with their spouse. So it's good to articulate at least what are the things that matter? Even beyond the obvious
Nancy: to be able to do that without self-editing in the sense of being able to say, this is going to hurt my career by doing this.
And that's an objective. And I think a lot of people jump in and be like then you're being selfish and you're all about your career. And they have all this shame and criticism about that. When in reality, that is playing. So let's throw it on the table as an objective. I've talked with my mom multiple times, so she's 79 and in great health, but we've talked about quality of life versus being locked down and how she can manage that because it's hard.
So being able to be honest about what those objectives are, even if they're not socially. Acceptable or sound good, but they're on the table. And I think that is one thing to recognize is how much we do tend to edit ourselves based on what we think other people will think. And this is a time when we need to just be really honest with ourselves and the people that we're making the decision with,
Michelle: Because it's by articulating what the objectives are that you can then. Really start brainstorming what might be some of the viable options that we can help deliver against. And, none of these objectives are necessarily binary. Like it's all, or nothing, usually a spectrum along which like you mentioned quality of life.
And yeah. That happening in our family too. My father-in-law really loves being able to pick his own produce at the grocery store. And at the beginning of the pandemic, we were all delivery all. Let's try to stay out of the public spaces, but in tracking the information and just noticing the impact on his quality of life.
We're re-evaluating okay. Are there ways. Are there certain grocery stores, like open air markets from markets, whatever, where he might be able to do that, but still in a way that seems safe enough for what we're trying to manage.
Nancy: Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. Okay. How can you brainstorm all the possible options?
Michelle: I think here's where I see a lot of people just start with the obvious but once you are able to pinpoint well, okay, given the options that are in front of us and how we're looking at our various objectives, where are some of our objectives not being met as much as maybe we would.
It's almost like feeling around the edges of this decision problem and then trying to see are there creative things that we can brainstorm like this being able to pick this up,
Nancy: Yeah. That's a great example of it.
Michelle: So exploring additional options should be driven by, what are the objectives that we're still trying to move the needle on.
And again, like when it comes to objectives, it's useful to think about them as a spectrum because. By thinking about them, not in an all or nothing, but as a spectrum, we can also define what is the range within which feels comfortable? I think about it almost like a mixer I'm thinking like audio levels and the mixer.
Yeah. Push up the base the whole time, the trouble, or what does it look like with the different pattern? Being able to see what's in front of you, like the obvious options and how well are they delivering against objectives now, and then seeing where you can push the edges a little bit.
And that's where you can direct your brainstorming.
Nancy: Okay. And then is this something you would recommend? My husband and I do this, and then we take it out to the. Family or we should be doing it as the larger family to begin with.
Michelle: So for decisions that impact a number of different people, or, especially if I'm family decisions, who's going to be feeling strong feelings about things it's useful to identify.
What are the objectives that each person involved has, or at least like the really high priority ones, because then you can also identify with. Overlap. And so when we were making decisions in our family and as I was consulting, some other people would identify, okay, where are people aligned on objectives?
Okay. We don't want to get sick. We don't want to get our loved ones sick. We don't want to be vectors for this disease. Okay. Can we all agree? Yes. Great then that could be used as a foundation for almost negotiating or playing with what are the other things that matter? What are the trade offs that we're willing to make given the things that we have in common?
Okay. And so the objectives piece useful to do for the bigger group, or at least get an understanding. You may not necessarily interview everyone. You can usually just from past conversations, what are the things I've come up and. Yes, it's full to brainstorm options in a smaller group and then bring them to bounce them off of others.
Nancy: Cause then it would just get out of control the brainstorming piece. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So then when you move to the third piece about the information. Tell me about that.
Michelle: Yeah. So the information piece is the place where things get sticky, right? For all the reasons we talked about before, around discomfort with uncertainty and things being dynamic.
And so this is where it's useful. Not only to think about what information do I have, but also how might I, de-risk this decision in the face of uncertainty? So I framed that because in full disclosure, I'm a risk averse person. I'm willing to take calculated risks. And that's where this idea of de-risking or at least thinking about ways you can, de-risk a decision come in.
And for example, recognizing that there might be an additional decision. When you have more information. And so like for travel planning, let's say that you're making all of these decisions based on the data that you have now, but you can also establish a trip. And so for example, if the data changes significantly between now, and when you plan to take that trip, how can you build in mechanisms so that you have the opportunity to make a new decision?
If you have very different information, let's say two weeks down the line that would impact that decision for people who fly thinking about. Okay. Yeah. How can I turn this into something that I may not be locked into? Or how can I maintain the opportunity to make a new decision if I do get new data?
Yeah.
Nancy: I love that. That's a great, that takes out some of the pressure that we need to figure this out right now.
Michelle: And what we decide now decides everything forever.
Nancy: Yes. I like the idea of the tripwire. This is what we're doing until this happens. And then we're going to reassess and go to plan B or. Great.
And then do you have B and C already planned or do you go back through the process of the objectives, options information?
Michelle: So I'm thinking specifically for holiday decisions, as opposed to what do you want to do next in your career? My sense is that the objective. Are you pretty consistent or probably stay consistent through this holiday season.
And so you may not need to revisit that for the options piece sometimes who knows new options might arise or someone in the group thought of a new idea. So maybe, and so you don't have to completely rehab. But I think it is useful at least for people who are planners, which
Nancy: raising my hand here Yeah, for sure.
Michelle: There can be a level of comfort in at least exploring if you're going to set a point in time that could be a tripwire. It could establish some comfort in at least thinking through what might be different courses of action. Okay.
Nancy: That makes sense. That makes sense. Okay. And you may not have a tip for this.
It is emotionally a landmine tips for navigating that.
Michelle: What are we talking about? Emotional landmine for ourselves, or also the emotions that go on everyone.
Nancy: Like a lot of my listeners are people pleasers and they want to make everyone happy. How do you navigate. That you might piss off your uncle by saying we're not coming.
Michelle: Yeah. So there's a couple things that come to mind one.
Okay. I'm laughing because I'm totally having a flashback to when I was planning my wedding and asking friends about their advice in wedding planning. And I just remember one of the best pieces of advice I got was. You're going to piss off everyone you love at least once. So when it happens, just check the box and move on.
Nancy: That is awesome. Oh my gosh. That's so true.
Michelle: At least that's a way of managing expectations because I think it's, we forget that it's impossible to please everyone. And I do think, especially when it comes to. Multifaceted decisions with multiple people involved. There are going to be people who are not completely happy with how things turn out or even the decision that was made.
And so I think there is, like a grain of truth to that piece of advice. It's very likely we're going to piss off everyone. And so when it happens, especially if we're talking about family and over the course of our lifetimes, which brings me to the second thing that comes to mind, and it's the idea of infinite versus finite games.
And so with our family, Oftentimes we're in an infinite game with them where I don't like characterizing it as game, but basically it's, we are going to have multiple interactions over time, often over a long period of time with our family. And so what we do at this one point in time, May not make or break things for eternity, versus if we were only playing one game, this party and everything was on the line at this one point in time, which I find isn't necessarily the case with families because we have such history with them going far back before this point in time.
And we likely are going to have more experiences with them. Yeah. After this point in time. This one piece of tile, just like a quote around things always seem to matter most in the moment when we're experiencing them. And yes, it feels that way. But if people can take a step back and realize in this context that this is one holiday season over how many we've had and how many more we hope to have.
Nancy: Yeah, because I keep reminding myself of that. This is one holiday season, this isn't the end of the world. Even though I know there are people out there that their parents are getting older or relatives, they don't know how many more holiday seasons they're going to have, but then that would go back to the objective.
Of recognizing, okay. One of the objectives is we want to celebrate the holiday with this person because we don't know how much longer they're going to be here. And that's an honest objective. So then we come up with an option that fits the rest of the objectives and that we want to be safe, et cetera, et cetera.
So we got to come up with a different option. Right or that I know I get so caught by the emotions and I don't have set my mom and I don't want to be seen as a wimp by my brother. Like I have all these dynamics, but this system you laid out, even the emotions are playing. It does give a way to objectively move through all this stuff.
Michelle: Because one of the things that I like to talk about is the fact that. Especially as humans. There's no such thing as just a slow thinking. Absence of all emotion, drive of decision for humans, we have emotions just like you said. So when emotions come up, it's useful to observe what is the emotion that is coming up?
Where's it coming from? And what can that tell me about this decision? Because sometimes the emotion is coming up because it's informing us of an objective that matters sometimes just the anxiety over the not knowing maybe it's coming up because oh, The information space, isn't completely clear and likely isn't going to be, but that's where the is coming from.
And so at least I advocate for people leaning into the emotion of it, at least enough to understand how could it be used as data.
Nancy: Ah, I love that, that I'm going to use that one just in general. I think emotions can provide a lot of them.
Michelle: If we're willing to observe with them and in that way, in a way that allows us to treat them as data.
Yeah.
Nancy: That's really helpful because it isn't so much about pulling out the emotion from the decision. It is. Let me welcome the emotion in a way that I'm a neutral observer to it and reading it.
Michelle: I'm based in the bay area. So two or three months into the lockdown or shelter in place that we had here, my mom had a very emotional reaction to the plans.
We were putting forth for our quarantine pod and she had made a remark and it's very teary-eyed around. This is not a way to. And I remember having a really emotional reaction and almost wanting to make a completely different decision because yeah, I care about my mom. I could see that she was really emotional and then I took a step back to ask of myself.
Okay. Given what I'm seeing in my mom what is both her emotion and my emotional reaction. Say about what's happening here. And I realized, oh, okay. Her emotional reaction is coming from a piece around one of the objectives she has and feels very strongly about is not being. And my emotion is coming up because I love my mom.
Yeah. All right. So she has an objective that isn't being met. Are there ways that we can think more creatively again about, can we revisit the options piece to see? Is there a slightly different tweak that we can make to our plans so that her objective is at least a little bit met? I think she was also thinking about this decision as the decision for the rest of time and yes.
Yes. Huh. It's not a way to live for, five, six years. Then we started talking, we were going to revisit the plan every month. So at least we're not trying to chase all the data from a day-to-day basis, but we are still trying to reevaluate as the data and as the situation evolves. And that, that also helped her wrap her head around.
Okay, I can do this for a month. And we'll talk again.
Nancy: And that would be like the trip wire. And so for example, if you have someone in your family who isn't as militant as you might be about the COVID protocols, Then that's the data in making your decision. You're just taking that in to recognize this person isn't going to be as on it.
And so I need to make sure I am aware of that as I'm moving through this. Okay. And that also takes out the emotion and the judgment of that person. Yes. Yeah. But that's just no, this is just data. We're just figuring this out. Okay. That's helpful because everyone has different. Rules and different capacities for what they're willing to do.
It can be overwhelming and trying to make everyone happy. And being able to pull back and recognize what's a feeling what's just information I need to use forward. And then how can we come up with options that can keep all of those in place somehow? Am I on it? Yeah. Okay.
All right. Cause it does just give us a new way of thinking about it and then also just the compassion for ourselves as to why this is so freaking hard.
Michelle Yes, There's a lot of things that are going on. It's like this year has produced a perfect storm of a lot of external influences along with like society and technology and all of these things that have made decision fatigue hit us in a way that is just so significant.
Nancy: So do you have any tips for reducing decision fatigue?
Michelle: Yes. If you think about it, decision fatigue, as I mentioned is a function of our reservoir of energy for these, the slow analytical thinking, being depleted. I talked to a lot of working parents and sometimes their reservoir is even smaller than it usually is just because.
They're not sleeping as much, or they don't have the outlets that they usually do. And so the recommendation to try to expand the capacity side of things is not for working parents because there's only so much that, right? Yes. Yeah. For people who may have the ability to. Put more attention into, what are those outlets that help you rebuild your reservoir, that help you replenish your energy to make these decisions again, like refueling the tank.
But I think a lot of my suggestions lie on the other side of things. Okay. So how is it that you manage the influx of decisions that. Are demanding attention from our slow thinking brain. And so one of the things that I recommend is thinking about how can you just either turn things into a non-decision or get it off?
Okay. And so what I mean by that is can you decide things in advance? Can you create a menu for the month or a few menus, weekly menus that you rotate through so that there are certain decisions that you have to come up, but you don't need to dedicate as much energy because you've decided in advance how you're going to deal with it.
So that's one decided advance another way of getting things off your bucket. Can you delegate, are there other people that you can delegate the little decisions too? And so I think that's also another distinction. There are going to be some decisions that you do want to reserve for your slow thinking brain that you want to use that tank a fuel for.
And then there are some. Don't like, what am I going to eat? What am I going to wear? So there's the, can you just not. Have them be decisions that you need to make, decide in advance or delegate. And then another thing to think about is sequencing. Our reservoir gets depleted over time, or maybe over the course of a day.
And so can you sequence some of these decisions so that you are safe? Your energy for the things that you really do want to use that slow thinking on for the beginning, when you absolutely know that you'll still have fuel in the tank instead of leaving them for when you might be running on fumes.
Nancy: That makes sense.
Michelle: Things that you may need to use your slow thinking brain for. Can you manage how much energy it takes. And so this is where I'm thinking about holidays and deciding what am I going to get whole bunch of my family members. And I can totally anticipate myself in the wee hours of the night after my baby's gone to sleep going down the road.
Oh, should I get this scarf or should it be a hundred percent wool or should it be recycled wool plus polyester? Or should it be wrecked? I plan to time box some of these decisions. What I mean by time boxing is decide in advance how much time. And I am I going to give myself to spend on this particular decision at the end of it?
Good to be done. So that's one way of managing how much time you're spending on these slow thinking decisions. Sometimes when I talk about the time boxing thing, I'm going to spend 30 minutes thinking about this decision by the end, I'm just going to make a decision. Sometimes I get pushback because people want to make the best decision or the right decision.
And there is something that I want to say about that piece because. Oftentimes, we want to make the right decision. But we don't stop to think about what actually makes this decision right? Or good. And this is where sometimes people fall victim to a very common fallacy when it comes to decision quality.
And they think that the quality of the decision is the same as the quality of the outcome. Or in other words, if the outcome of the decision is good, I must've made a good decision, but if the outcome is bad, I must've made a bad decision. Yes. But that's not actually true. Because the outcome is a function, not just of what we decide, but also often of other things that are outside of our control.
And so like really simple example, this upcoming weekend, I looked at a weather report and it's supposed to be no rain or maybe very slight chance of right. And so what if our family decides to go on a hike and let's say fast forward to the weekend and we go on this hike and it does rain. What's that necessarily a bad decision.
Not necessarily, I didn't decide for it to rain, but oftentimes we wear that baggage of that outcome. I must've made a bad decision. And so I say all that to try to remind people that we can only make the best decision we can. Given the information that we have.
Nancy: Ah, thank you for that. That was gold right there.
Oh, it's a great reminder. Like we all know that, but the reminder of that is so great.
Michelle: I was just thinking about the holiday gift thing and wanting to make the best decision and sometimes. And sometimes it's useful to ask one, how would I know if it's really the best decision and also is that incremental difference over what would be good enough really worth the extra time, effort and fatigue, all of these things.
And sometimes. That's the mindset that can help shake us out of wanting to just like optimize, because there often is no. So this is the thing, even though I studied decision engineering, which is supposed to be the discipline of how to make or optimize decisions, the one thing that I've realized when it comes to human decision making is that there's very rarely an optimum.
Decision. And so at the end of the day, sometimes I tell clients the best decision is going to be the one that you are happiest living with
Nancy:. Yes, that is well said. And so on that note, because that was just brilliant. I think this was so helpful and just a really new way of reframing. Stuff. So thank you for coming on and be the guest and helping us through this COVID holiday time.
Michelle: Absolutely. I love talking about decision making and helping untangle messy decisions.
Nancy: Oh my gosh. I learned so much from Michelle and she made what feels like an overwhelming process, much more manageable. My takeaways were to be honest with myself and to be clear on my objection. To think outside the box and be creative to honor the feelings that keep coming up and treating them as data.
And most importantly, to practice kindness to myself and to my loved ones