5 ways to make important decisions without emotions

When making important decisions, you are often guided not by facts and common sense but by your emotions. Of course, what you feel is extremely important: it helps you understand what is acceptable for you and what is not, allows you to realize your fears, and identify problems that you may encounter in the future. But in some cases, you need to be able to put aside emotions and trust only logic. This is not easy, but we have collected several ways to help you with this. 

1. Think about whether your decision will benefit you in the long run.

Your main mistake is that you most often evaluate your actions in the short term. If you understand that right now, in a few hours or the next day after making a decision, you will feel good, get what you need, and improve your life, you are very likely to do everything that is required of you, especially not thinking. 

It is completely different if your decision is associated with some inconvenience, after which the quality of life will increase significantly. This will make a choice much more difficult. The first thing you think about is that soon you will feel bad. All the advantages of the decision being made will be blocked by the unwillingness to endure inconvenience and experience negative emotions. So if you want to learn how to make choices in favor of what will change your life for the better, you will have to consider your decisions in the long term. 

2. Make a decision only when you are calm 

It is extremely easy to make many mistakes when making important decisions if you do it on emotions. Remember: whenever you have the opportunity to delay your choice a little, try to use it. Ask for time to think before answering someone, do not rush yourself to conclusions, do not demand from yourself an instant plan, and so on. You do not need to rush: in most situations, nothing will change if you wait until your condition returns to normal. 

While angry, frustrated, shocked, hurt, or euphoric, give yourself a chance to experience those emotions first. When the feelings subside, you can look at the situation and evaluate all the information available to you, the pros and cons of each decision. In addition, you will get rid of the desire to choose another person’s evil, to perform any action on principle.

3. Don’t change a decision you’ve already made after a while

Often, when making an important decision that can greatly affect your future destiny, you first show stamina and steadfastness, and after some time, you begin to doubt your choice. If you have determined a strategy for further actions, based on the facts available to you, guided by life experience, and relying on existing knowledge and skills, you did everything right. Doubts, in this case, are inevitable because disturbing thoughts periodically arise in the head that it is better not to take risks.

Remember that you have no guarantees that everything will turn out exactly as you planned. But this does not mean you should abandon your decision and stay in your comfort zone. If you minimize risks and want to completely abandon actions that may not lead you to your desired goal, you will continue to stagnate in the same place.

Do not change your decisions – at least until new important information is revealed to you that may affect the results of your work. Be true to yourself and your choice – often, success depends on whether you can follow the strategy you have thought out without changing it along the way.

4. Do what you’re afraid of

When making a decision, you may encounter certain difficulties: you will have to choose between an easy path that will lead you to mediocre results and a difficult path, which, if successful, will achieve exactly what you dream of. 

Many people, faced with this choice, lean towards the first option: it is safer, and they understand that they are more likely to emerge victorious from the situation. But do not rush to follow their example – do what you are afraid of. Only in this way will you be able to overcome your fears, realize your potential and achieve what you want. Throw away the feeling of fear when making a decision, and remember that fear most often points to the correct option.

5. Don’t Ignore the Advice of Others

Often you may not notice some obvious things that can affect decision-making. Again, this is due to your emotions: when you are too focused on how you feel, a lot is hidden from your field of vision. In such situations, it is important not to withdraw into yourself and use every opportunity to look at what is happening from the other side.

One such opportunity is to discuss the situation with the people around you. This does not mean you need to pay more attention to what they say or think. Of course, people are often biased and build their assumptions and advice based on a sense of envy, their fears and experiences, and their negative experiences.

But it is also worth remembering that others can point you to possible mistakes and miscalculations, open up new perspectives, and suggest action options that you have not thought about. Don’t ignore what other people tell you. Often there is useful information in their words that you can use.