Many people struggle to make important decisions and when they do, just end up procrastinating. How can you make decisions and then take action?
Make the decision with your goal in mind.
To make an effective decision, you need to have your goal in mind. When you have a choice that you’re not sure about, it’s often because you’ve forgotten to keep your mind on your goal. You’ve lost focus. When having to choose between two or more paths to take, ask yourself which choice will increase the likelihood of you reaching your goal.
Lose the fear.
You may be fearful that you’ll make the wrong decision. Have some faith in yourself. You’re an intelligent being surrounded by intelligent beings. Think about the situation yourself and if you’re still not sure, ask for some advice from those who are more experienced than you.
Accept that you made the right decision.
Once you’ve made the decision, don’t worry whether you made the right decision or not. If you do, you’ll sabotage your efforts and fail to take sufficient action through to completion. If you’re full of self-doubt, then I doubt you’ll succeed.
Make a plan.
Write down a plan to carry out your decision. Make sure you know the sequence of steps you need to take. Planning helps you to stay productive and focused. You’ll be less likely to stray from the path leading to your goal if you have a good plan in place.
Find the right motivation.
From the start, you need to stay motivated. Write down as many benefits as possible you’ll experience if you act upon your decision and reach your goal. Use visualization to help you see yourself as already having completed your goal and experiencing those benefits.
What else can we do to help to make decisions and reach our goals?
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G'day! I'm Gordie, founder and editor-in-chief of Lifestyle Design For You. I want to welcome you to the center of the universe when it comes to lifestyle design and personal development blogs. We're a team of ten writers providing you with articles to help nourish your mind and improve your life. Lifestyle design is about designing your life so you can do what you want when you want. 
{ 32 comments… read them below or add one }
Great post Gordie – the basics that we all need to follow. I am a victim of all of them at different times for different reasons. I think procarastination is my biggest downfall in certain parts of my life, and then sometimes its the hunger to feal the fear and th buzz when I get it.
Great advice matey.
Chris
Cheers, Chris! Procrastination is a problem for most humans at various times, but it’s conquerable.
You gotta have ‘the fear’ – Joey from Friends.
…But don’t get paralyzed by it. For me, the biggest obstacle is the fear, even if I don’t think that “I’m afraid” of something, I sometimes overanalyze “what might happen” and end up doing nothing. It feels great when you get over that moment and achieve your goals and at the end, you realize that you would’ve been there faster if you’d spend less time worrying about the outcome and just take action.
Antti Kokkonen’s last blog ..Review of the Beginner’s Guide to Twitter
Perhaps I should have said ‘ignore fear’. I think feel the fear and do it anyway is great advice.
Really nice post. It is really important to focus on your goal and get rid of all doubts… But when you do it there is still something inside you asking is your choice right…? And what if now… Damn… I am not good in making fast decisions…
KreCi’s last blog ..MiniUrlz 1.1.1 released with bug fix!
Making fast decisions can be daunting at first. Hang in there, KreCi. The benefits are worth it.
I gotta say, “Getting Things Done” really helped “cure” my procrastination problems. It’s all about the “next action” – figuring out what the next step is in moving towards a goal and more importantly, keeping that action small, specific and attainable. And agreed – writing things down is critical. I try to end my day with a brain dump of things I want to get done the next day. Then in the morning, I order the list and tick them them off one by one. (P.S. Found your blog via tumblemoose – good stuff!.)
Monica Shaw’s last blog ..Book Marketing Advice From Penny Sansevieri
Hi Monica,
It’s great to meet you. I just checked out your blog and followed you on Twitter. I see you’re a writer. I admire writers. If you see anywhere in my post where I can write something smoother and more efficiently, please let me know from time to time. I’d really appreciate it. I’m really trying to work on my writing lately.
I agree with you in that I also prefer to write to do lists at night. It means you don’t need to worry about forgetting to do things while trying to go to sleep.
Thanks.
Love the new site design Gordie and I haven’t forgot I still owe you a quest post. I am whipping my self now for the lack of discipline.
Jonny | thelifething.com’s last blog ..Some Bad Ass Travel Tips To Let You Be A Smug Bar-stuard Even In The Company Of Seasoned Travelers: You Know You Are Going To Read This
Looking forward to your post. Whip away, baby!
I would add that you really need to exercise your decision making muscles as often as you can. This post applies to the big decisions, but the problem for us bloggers is that for every big decision, we often have to make dozens or even hundreds of small ones every day. And because we tend to be lone entrepreneurs, we often don’t have the luxury of delegating them or “running them past” another person.
As a consequence it’s easy to get mired in a sea of small decisions and end up taking no action.
My tip: Get into the habit of making the decision right now, every time. Don’t allow yourself to “think about that one.” JFDI. Yes you’ll get a few wrong, but by getting used to actually doing things and taking action without hesitation, you’ll actually get better and better at making the right call.
Mike CJ’s last blog ..Dear CEO of the Company Spamming my Blog
Great insight, Mike into the into the complexities of decision making for bloggers and entrepreneurs. I like your idea of making decisions right now. As you said, you’ll get a few wrong, but your decision making skill we become more honed with practice.
Great advice, focusing on the goals or end result is what motivates us to take action. We cannot think our way to success, sooner or later action has to be taken.
I like the lose the fear part. Don’t be frozen with fear, do something.
Jimi Jones’s last blog ..Looking Ahead: Blogging in 2010
Action is what is required to conquer fear. I know you’re a man of action Jimi.
Gordie, great hints and timely reminders for many of us and I put my hand up to some of these. I tend to fluctuate!! Some times I am almost anally retentive and mentally get blocked up and don’t do anything and at others I am just totally spontaneous. Makes for an interesting mix.,
Kevin Tea’s last blog ..By: Kevin Tea
Yeah, a bit of spontaneity doesn’t hurt. The main thing is to try to build some consistency.
I think the part that stuck out to me the most is letting go of the what-ifs and doubts that come after making a decision. It’s so hard to make a decision when you know you’ll be in turmoil over it even after you’ve made it. Decide beforehand that your decisions are final. You’re a grown-up. You can live with whatever your decision brings.
Erica Mueller’s last blog ..Personal Wordpress Theme from BloggingTips.com
Good idea, Erica. We are mature enough to deal with the consequences of our decisions.
Thank you for this post Gordie. It came on a day when I needed a little inspiration and the motivation to make a big leap of faith.
Patty Reiser’s last blog ..Look at those Eyes
Great, Patty! What’s up?
Hi Gordie,
What great advice. My favorite is “accept you made the right decision.” In the past I use to make a decision and then start second guessing myself. Not good!
P.S. I came here via George’s review of your site. Congratulations on the honor.
Barbara Swafford’s last blog ..Save Time:Copy And Paste A Post
Hi Barbara,
It was very nice of George to say such great things about my blog. Knock that second guessing habit on the head to get ahead.
For me the two biggest issues is Fear and I suppose a sub category of that, Fear of failure, making the wrong decision.
Robert Bravery’s last blog ..Farmville 3.8 times more popular than Twitter.
Hey Robert,
Looking at how your blog is improving, I’d say there’s no need to fear failure. You’re on the right track.
Hi Gordie.
Good call on making the decision with goal in mind. Then, we don’t have to think about the decision, and can focus on how we are getting further. Decisions are usually small pieces of a larger story, so getting weighed down by one is like spending 30 minutes trying to find the spot for a piece in a 500-piece puzzle set.
Putting the goal above short-term gains can be hard, but those who do get both short and long-term gains.
Armen Shirvanian’s last blog ..Discussion On Long Versus Short-Term Efforts
Good analogy about the puzzle piece, Armen.
I love your thinking pose too:) But sometimes you just need to follow your instincts. Go on, you know what the right answer is don’t you?!
Lol! I’m starting to enjoy posing for photos now.
Gordie,
Very interesting subject: How can you make decisions and then take action?
It is very simple: Be aware that you are making decisions anyway! Even when you believe that you are not making decisions, even when you don’t take action, you are still making decisions! When you realize this, you will have the option of making a decision that moves you closer to your goals, or allowing that something happens that moves you away from your dear goals.
All the best!
Boris
Cheers, Boris!
In my opinion these are all good ideas to look at and set fourth.
I also like looking at the why of things. If you have a strong enough ‘why’ then you can accomplish just about any how. Just have a reason and then figure out how you’re going to go about making it happen. If you ever have any doubt about something simply come back to why you are going about doing this.
You can have more than one why too. The why is the strength. The how is the way.
Good article!
Eric´s last blog ..The Way I Blog With Ease
Yes, I think in some ways that fits into the motivation part of it. You want to know why something is worthwhile to you.