Indecisiveness Can Help You Make Better Decisions
By: Maria Milojković
Tags: Work, Mental Health, Self Improvement, Indecision, Life

Indecisiveness Can Help You Make Better Decisions

And Bezos could hire you for the C-Suite

“ I’ve never been able to plan my life. I just lurch from indecision to indecision.” Alan Rickman

Indecisiveness can be debilitating. The more you hesitate, the fewer decisions you’ll make. You may end up with genuine regrets because you spent so much time considering what to do instead of actually doing something.

But what if indecisiveness makes you smarter?

Jeff Bezos looks for smart people who often change their minds

It turns out smart people are often indecisive because they can see both the good and the bad in every situation. Therefore, when they are in a position to decide, they don’t do it for good.

Also, being able to predict the consequences of their decision, people in two minds try to postpone it until they get more information. They bide their time.

Intelligent people are aware of the fact they can be wrong. For that reason, they are more willing to change their minds when they have already reached a decision.

Thinking you may be wrong is a sign of curiosity and being open to new information. This quality of the mind to be so flexible is called intellectual humility. Duke University explains it as open-mindedness to different views on morality, religion, way of life, etc.

Mark Leary, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke says:

“If you’re sitting around a table at a meeting and the boss is very low in intellectual humility, he or she isn’t going to listen to other people’s suggestions. Yet we know that good leadership requires broadness of perspective and taking as many perspectives into account as possible.”

In an interview that Bezos gave a few years ago to Basecamp, the Amazon founder said he doesn’t see the consistency of thought as a positive quality. On the contrary, you are smarter if you have one idea today, and a contradictory one tomorrow:

“He’s observed that the smartest people are constantly revising their understanding, reconsidering a problem they thought they’d already solved. They’re open to new points of view, new information, new ideas, contradictions, and challenges to their own way of thinking.”

Still, there’s a catch.

Not every kind of indecisiveness is the same

Indecisiveness ranges from perfectly normal to pathological. There are many reasons why you find it hard to decide:

Maybe you feel you need more information to be able to choose properly.

Or believe there is a better solution to the problem.

You overanalyze things.

Your perfectionism.

Desire to please others.

The fear of making a mistake.

Being afraid to take responsibility.

Maybe you are a highly sensitive person.

Or insecure.

Sometimes people can’t even decide what they want for dinner.

Kimberly Key, Ph.D., the author of Ten Keys to Staying Empowered in a Power Struggle, in her article for Psychology Today says that indecisiveness often has roots in childhood:

“ If a child was told “no” to their answers and directed in all of their answers, over time the cognitive dissonance between their desires and those of the hand that feeds them will lessen and cut them off from their desire. They may rebel and have trouble with authority and do all kinds of things that go against what others want in an attempt to be free, yet the scar of not trusting their instincts may be so severe that they can never connect to what they want.”

To help their kids practice decision-making skills, the experts advise parents to let children make choices about small things every day. To ask them what they want to wear or eat. To make it easier, parents could give them 2 options to choose from so children don’t get overwhelmed.

But what if it goes too far?

Some people are indecisive because they are afraid of a disaster. In extreme cases, obsessive indecisiveness can be qualified as a disorder:

“ Aboulomania is a mental disorder in which the patient displays pathological indecisiveness. It is typically associated with anxiety, stress, depression, and mental anguish, and can severely affect one’s ability to function socially. Although many people suffer from indecision, it is rarely to the extent of obsession.” - Wikipedia

Luckily, average hesitancy can be solved over time.

How to deal with indecisiveness

Karin Sieger, a psychotherapist, also claims that being irresolute is completely fine. In her text Why indecisiveness can be valid and helpful, Sieger writes that our attitude towards indecisiveness is what’s causing us trouble. Sometimes we just need more time to think and explore, to be ready to make a choice.

Sieger claims that if you are impatient or frustrated about your own indecision, you will only make things worse:

“Self blame can be toxic in situations, when we need our focus and energy to decide on important and perhaps life changing issues. Self criticism can keep us stuck and dithering. Not trusting ourselves can be disempowering and stifles personal growth.”

Instead, Sieger advises us to ask ourselves: Why am I not ready to decide? and accept what we are feeling instead of being frustrated.

“ Because ideas and possibilities need to mature a bit further. “

Therefore, indecisiveness can be a signal you need more time. So, cut yourself some slack and wait for the moment when you will finally reach your decision.

The other way you can use your hesitation isto make your relationships deeper.

Indecisiveness makes you more compassionate

Sitting on the fence gives you the ability to see a situation from different angles. Or as postmodernists believe, there is no universal truth but a multitude of individual ones. And you can see a few.

Moreover, indecisiveness increases your empathy because you can understand others well. You are able to feel them and realize what galvanizes them.

More often than not, indecisive persons are glad to be where they are. They just don’t feel uncomfortable enough to want to change their situation.

Only when you are truly irritated, you will do something about it and change that status quo.

Sometimes you let the other person decide because you show your love that way. You don’t mind to do whatever they feel like doing. To you, it’s no big deal.

What the most famous indecisive person can teach us

Remember Shakespeare? Prince Hamlet is depressed and fed up with life. Throughout the play, he can’t make up his mind if he should kill himself.

Or is it really that simple?

“To be, or not to be: that is the question:

Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,

Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,

And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;” — Hamlet’s soliloquy from Hamlet, Act 3, Scene 1

“To be or not to be” is the question of human existence. To Hamlet, to be alive means to be passive and suffer the blows of fortune you can do nothing about. You can set yourself free from the suffering if you decide to kill yourself. So, to live is to be passive and to die — to be active.

But there is a paradox: you can die only if you take action while you are still alive. And you can’t do anything because you don’t have the power of action in life.

Although you may want to die, there’s a catch. You don’t know what’s waiting for you when you pass away. And it may be worse than life itself. The fear of the unknown is stopping Hamlet from killing himself.

Also, committing suicide is a religious sin. Because “conscience does make cowards of us all” Hamlet decides to go on living and suffer.

Moreover, Hamlet is considering another sin — killing his uncle Claudius because Claudius killed Hamlet’s father (Old Hamlet). Young Hamlet considers if he should revenge his father by murdering his murderer. By the end of this soliloquy, Hamlet says that too much thinking about the action prevents him from doing it.

Hamlet delays his decision to kill Claudius because he doesn’t want to kill an innocent man and wants to check if Claudius really killed Old Hamlet.

In all his indecisiveness, young Hamlet is a very reasonable man.

Embrace your indecision

Funnily enough, we are all talking about love, empathy, and soul, yet most people see the world through a lens of productivity, efficiency, and brutal determination.

If you are not ready to decide on something bigger, remember that indecision is also a decision.

Indecisiveness is a mark that you see the world in full color. It makes you wiser since you don’t rush into things. As you change your mind, you can make better choices. You are smart enough to be aware of the relativity of truth in real life.

You understand others better and are able to establish deeper, more meaningful connections. You are a good listener.

Indecisiveness is a part of who you are. Although you may get on other people’s nerves, the founder of Amazon would never employ those people for the c-suite.

So, cherish your hesitancy. Seeing different aspects of something which other people don’t see is a plus. Indecision can be good. It makes you more aware of the world around you.