How Do I Make Decisions When There Are So Many Choices?

August 28, 2014 by Paula Prober 30 Comments

How do you get anywhere or do anything when you’re overwhelmed with emotions, ideas, career options, thoughts and worries?

How do you choose when perfection is at stake?

How do you choose when you have to grieve over all of those lost opportunities?

How do you choose when every step your carbon footprint takes matters?

What can you do to manage the plethora of possibilities? How do you actually make a decision?

In another post, I describe multipotentiality. How you can find and create your career paths when you have multiple interests and abilities. How you can prove to yourself that you’re not an irresponsible unreliable flake.

What else?

I wish I could say, just eat more chocolate.

Or spend a month on a tropical island.

Or read everything ever written by Ursula Le Guin.

But I’d be leading you astray.

Not that those things won’t help.

But, I have a suggestion that might be less appealing but more effective over time. I know this isn’t a new idea. But hear me out anyway.

Find and develop your intuition. Tune into your inner wisdom. Practice learning the difference between how your cognitive mind works and how your intuition works. Build a meditation practice and use yoga or tai chi or walking in the forest to get your mental cacophony calm enough to hear your Essential Self or your Authenticity or your Wisdom or your Pips.

This isn’t easy. Maybe you just want to eat more chocolate. I won’t judge you if that’s what you choose. I mean I’ve found all sorts of reasons to avoid meditating regularly. I keep my Essential Self locked in the basement most days. But I promise, I’ll give it a shot if you will.

Where do we start? You’ve probably got the books on your shelf. You’ve just ignored them like I have. In case you need another book, try this one by Belleruth Naparstek. Or go to her website for a great selection of guided imagery CDs.

Then let me know how it goes.

And if you decide that instead, you want to eat chocolate on a tropical island while reading Ursula Le Guin, well, who am I to judge.

______________________________

To my blogEEs: I’m serious. I want to hear your thoughts about intuition, meditation and finding your Essential Self. So please share.

And thanks to Kathy for her comments that inspired this post.

Author: Paula Prober

I'm a psychotherapist in private practice in Eugene, Oregon. I specialize in counseling gifted adults and consulting with parents of gifted children. The label "gifted" is often controversial and confusing. I use the metaphor of the rain forest to describe this population. Like the rain forest, these individuals are quite complex, highly sensitive, intense, multi-layered, and misunderstood. They're also curious, idealistic, highly intelligent, creative, perfectionistic, and they love learning. I've been an adjunct instructor at the University of Oregon and a guest presenter at Oregon State University and Pacific University. I've written articles on giftedness for the Eugene Register-Guard, the Psychotherapy Networker, and Advanced Development Journal. My book, Your Rainforest Mind: A Guide to the Well-Being of Gifted Adults and Youth, was released in June 2016 by GHF Press and is available on Amazon or at your independent bookstore.