Thursday, December 12, 2013

Tough Decisions: Making the RIGHT choice

“Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make big choices in life.  Because almost everything, all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure, just fall away in the face of death leaving only what is truly important…There is no reason not to follow your heart.”

Steve Jobs

We are all faced with decision every day and many of these decision will have a tremendous impact on our future.  Some decisions we face are big and the consequences of them can last a lifetime.  For this reason, I love Steve Jobs’ quote above and have found that when I act as if I will soon be dead, the right way to go becomes more clear.  

The truth is recently I’ve been faced with a very important decision that will most certainly determine my course in life over the next few years at the very least and will probably impact my entire course in life.  As you can imagine, I’ve had a very difficult time deciding which way to go.  I’ve swayed back and forth, listed the pros and cons of both choices, have experimented with both options, and have thought and thought and thought it over and over again in my head, and have lost many hours of sleep over it.  I finally decided I must act as if I’ll be soon be dead and this thought changed my perspective and helped me make what I believe to be the right choice. 

Now from an outside perspective, my choice may seem foolish or dumb to many.  But focusing on the most important things in our life and what we truly want most helps us make choices based on wisdom and appropriate risks rather than ego, greed, fear, or other emotions.

The same can happen for you.  Life is too short not to follow our hearts and do what we truly want to do.  Hopefully, each of us knows what we want most in life, those two or three things that are at the very top of our list of importance in life and then we should do what it takes to have them.  We can’t expect to live forever after all.  Making decisions as if we were about to die helps us see more clearly and eliminates pride, fear, and embarrassment as Jobs’ offers in his quote above. 

So when facing difficult decisions, change your view and know that you will be dead soon.  With that in mind, make a wise choice.  As Jobs’ stated, “There is no reason [for us] not to follow [our] hearts!”     

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