14 Easy Ways to Improve Decision Making
Our life is a direct result of the choices that we have made at each point along the way and we do not always do a good job at deciding what is best for us.
If we all made sound judgments we would not act irrationally, engage in needless conflicts, forego gains in order to spite others, make impulsive purchases, marry wrong partners and wrongly invade other countries. But the truth is that we do all of the above without even realizing how much our decision-making mistakes are costing us.
Unfortunately, it is not always simple to make the right decision and behave ‘optimally’.
However, there are a few things that we can do to noticeably improve our decision making skills and reduce the number of less than perfect choices that we rightly call “mistakes”:
1. Consider ‘opportunity’ cost.
Making good decisions does not always mean weighting costs against benefits. You have to take into consideration the ‘opportunity cost’ or what you give up by choosing another option. For example, reading friends’ updates on facebook can be a form of enjoyment and relaxation, but this is the time you could be spending doing something way more enjoyable like playing badminton with a friend, writing for your blog or jogging.
