How to Win Your Day by Making Fewer Decisions
Become a minimalist in decision-making.
Has it ever crossed your mind why candy bars are typically placed at store registers? Is there a science behind it? A superstition? Or, is it just a mere coincidence that all the stores in the world seem to have a similar layout?
To answer this question, let’s look at a study conducted more than a decade ago.
In 2010, researchers in Israel conducted a study on how judges make decisions on whether to approve or reject paroles for convicted criminals.
After examining more than a thousand hearings in the span of 10 months, they uncovered that the time of these hearings was issued played a huge factor in the judges’ decisions.
They found out that a judge was more inclined to approve parole (about 65 percent of the time) if the hearing was held early in the day. However, as the day went on, the chance of a favorable ruling declined steadily to zero and then went back up to 65 percent right after lunch.
Multiple variables had been taken into accounts, such as the criminal behavior in prison, the type of crime committed, and the criminal’s education, but this trend still persisted throughout.
So, what happened here? Simple. Every time those judges made decisions, they were using up their decision-making budget, also known as willpower.
Willpower is like your biceps
Most people view willpower as a mysterious, abstract concept. They think that some people naturally have an abundance of it, while others aren’t so lucky with their lack of self-control.
However, in reality, willpower is just like a muscle: Train it often and it’ll get stronger, work it out too much and it gets fatigued. When your willpower muscle is fatigued, you’ll start to make bad decisions — often without you noticing.
The idea of this ‘willpower muscle’ stemmed from scientists' understanding of our anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). They believe that the ACC — this little C-shaped part of our brain which can be found at the front of the cingulate cortex — is the seat of willpower.
Think of your ACC as some sort of a rechargeable battery. When you wake up from a good night’s sleep, it’s fully charged, but every time you make a decision, you chip away some of it.
Bigger decisions, such as granting parole to a convicted criminal drain will drain more battery. Deciding what to eat for breakfast or which clothes to wear to work will also use some.
However, making these unmonitored trivial decisions throughout the day will hinder your ACC from performing at its best. Your willpower muscle will run out of power. And once it does, it’ll be easier for you to cave into temptations and give in to bad decisions.
Psychologists refer to this phenomenon as decision fatigue.
You’re walking down the supermarket aisle…
- Colgate or Sensodyne?
- Red meat, chicken breasts, or fish?
- Do I really need to get this much toilet paper?
- Why would I buy yogurts instead of ice cream when their calories are pretty much the same?
- Damn! That girl is hot. Should I ask for her number? (Alright, maybe not this one.)
We all have these inner monologues all the time at the supermarket. We even do math with our phones’ calculator to compute the price per serving to look for the best bang for the buck. Hell, I even do math inside my head to get the price per 1g of protein for comparison (broke bodybuilders would know).
All these calculations, comparisons, analyzations and finally making decisions are taxing to the brain. By the time you arrive at the checkout counter, the Snickers bar that you ignored earlier now looks like a snack eaten by the gods. So you grab one for a quick hit of sugar to give your brain more energy.
And that’s why all stores put their candy bars and chips at the cash register. They know that you’re more likely to be experiencing decision fatigue at the end of your grocery trip. They know you’re more prone to impulse buying when your guard is down.
Of course, this phenomenon doesn't occur exclusively in grocery shops or parole hearings. It happens in your daily life too.
The question now becomes: How do you make sure you use your daily decision-making budget to the best of your ability before it gets fatigued?
1. Schedule your parole hearings for the morning, and protect them at all costs
In other words, you should:
Do your most important work when your willpower is at its peak.
This is self-explanatory. Schedule your important meetings in the morning, or after lunch. Write that novel after you had your breakfast.
“If it’s your job to eat a frog, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning. And If it’s your job to eat two frogs, it’s best to eat the biggest one first.” — Mark Twain
Next, guard it like a dragon would guard its treasure.
Protect your most important task of the day. Tell everyone you shouldn’t be disturbed with trivial matters during this period. There shouldn’t be anything that can distract you anywhere in close proximity. The phone should be turned off, emails shouldn’t be opened in another tab, and your desk should be distraction-free.
2. A decision doesn’t have to be made if it’s not one to begin with
Let me say that again: You don’t have to make a decision if it’s not a decision in the first place.
And how exactly are you going to do that?
Simple.
Set up a morning routine.
Or a night routine, or an afternoon routine. Ideally, the first decision you have to make (after eight hours of sleep) is when you’re already at your desk engaged in your work, or in the meeting, or on the first question of the exam, or the first answer to the first question of the interview. You get my point.
Don’t think about your routine.
Don’t snooze your alarm — snoozing is a decision too. If you had already decided to do a trifecta of cold shower, meditation, and exercise every morning as a part of your routine, then execute them without delay.
It’s better to just get on with it rather than wasting 10 minutes thinking about whether you should do it or not. We both know you'll end up doing it anyway out of guilt. Not to mention some of your decision budgets will be used in the process too.
When it comes to routine, don’t think; do.
3. Automate like Steve, Mark, and Barrack
Steve “Perfectionist” Jobs wore a black turtleneck, blue jeans, and New Balance sneakers every day. Mark “The Robot” Zuckerberg typically has a grey shirt on (he literally owns about 20 identical grey T-shirts) with jeans. Barrack “The Model Husband and Dad” Obama always wear gray or blue suits to work.
Why do these high performers wear the same outfit every day?
In 2014, Zuckerberg answered in Q&A:
“I really want to clear my life to make it so that I have to make as few decisions as possible about anything except how to best serve this community.”
In an interview by Michael Lewis for Vanity Fair, Obama explained:
“You’ll see I wear only gray or blue suits. I’m trying to pare down decisions. I don’t want to make decisions about what I’m eating or wearing. Because I have too many other decisions to make. You need to focus your decision-making energy. You need to routinize yourself. You can’t be going through the day distracted by trivia.”
Now, unless you’re stupid rich, the president of your country, or you don’t care what people think, you shouldn’t wear the same clothes every day. Your boss and colleagues will think you’re unhygienic, and they will look at you funny.
What you should do instead is opt for “capsule wardrobe”, and even “capsule diet”.
Capsule Wardrobe
Pick four or five tops, jackets, bottoms, and shoes, all in neutral colors such as gray, white, and black. Plan so that every piece in your closet can match with each other, to the point where you can pick the tops and bottoms with your eyes closed and still look good.
Next, get rid of or hide your other clothes that don’t fit your “theme” so that you have only twenty or so items in your closet.
The main purpose of a capsule wardrobe is to avoid daily decisions about what to wear on normal occasions such as going to work, grocery shopping, or running errands. Of course, you should keep some special pieces for rare occasions and formal events.
Capsule Diet
The idea is the same: Every week, pick four or five healthy, tasty recipes you can cook on autopilot that you and your family enjoy. The aim is to avoid thinking about what to cook daily and what to buy during a trip to your local Walmart.
Dinner is an exception. Since nighttimes are usually for winding down after working hard in the day, you can splurge a bit and use your remaining decision budget to reward yourself.
Life is all about balance, and food is no exception. Eating is life’s greatest pleasure after all.
4. Become the third person for a week
Observe your daily life religiously for a week. Take note every time you’re about to make a decision, and then:
Write it down.
Write it down.
Write it down.
There, I said it three times in three different formats to emphasize how important it is to write it down (and the fourth).
Science has backed this up: Your brain sucks at retaining memory. So, unless you’re Boris Konrad, you’re most likely won’t remember the trivial daily decisions you’ve made (do you even remember what you wear three days ago?).
Now, hopefully, after you wrote it down somewhere, ask yourself these two questions:
- Did this decision matter?
- In the future, can I automate it, ignore it, or ask someone else to do it rather than making the decision on my own?
After a week, review what you had written and find a way to minimize those daily decisions you have to make, especially the ones before you get to do your “big thing” of the day.
The takeaway recap
Everyone knows the secret to success is to win your day, every day. But, not everyone knows that making decisions on trivial matters is their number one productivity killer that prevents them from working at their absolute best.
To make the most out of your day, you have to design your daily life such that your most important work of the day gets to be done close to perfection. This can be done by:
- Doing your most important work early in the day.
- Setting up a morning routine, and committing to it with no delay.
- Automating trivial matters such as what to wear and what to eat.
- Observing the decisions you make for a week.
When everything is at stake, are you going to make the right move, the correct decision, or are you going to crumble under pressure just like the average John Doe would?
You decide.
