6 Most Effective Steps to Making Difficult Decisions

Indecision when faced with difficult decisions, is a total mojo killer. 

When making difficult decisions it totally drains you, and wastes your time. When chronic, it creates anxiety and depression.

If you're constantly making difficult decisions but can't seem to choose, that indecision just plain squelches your self-confidence.

Many of my clients have problems with decision making, probably because it's one of my weak points. "As within, so without" kinda stuff. I'm a bright and shiny object person with a VERY active and creative mind. I have had to ramp that quality down to become a successful entrepreneur.

I have found these 6 steps to be most effective and help me immensely when faced with having to make a difficult decision.

1. First I place both options in a win-win model. When trying overcome indecision, instead of looking at all the bad "what-if's", I look at the benefits of each option. This opens my mind to what is possible, what can be gained, and what will feel good. What we focus on expands, so starting my process this way, removes the fear and replaces it with excitement.

2. Get clear on your priorities. Tough decisions require you to do some soul searching on what you really want out of life and where you want to be in the future. How do you want to FEEL in your life. What makes you happy and fulfilled? You can't decide if something is right for you, if you don't know where you want to go.

3. Ask "Is this taking me towards my goals?" I love the phrase, "Losers are comfort seekers, winners are goal achievers" because it summarizes my weakness of seeking what is easy and comfortable. Just to clarify- I don't mean loser in it's usual sense. When I say that to myself I mean "loser" to mean losing out on opportunity, money, joy, pride - not being a bad person. It was a survival tactic when I had panic disorder, but now it's a saboteur. That phrase is a cue to assess whether I am choosing the comfort option (what is not going to take me where I want o go) or with winner option. You want whatever decision you make to bring you business success, not keep you in the same place.

4. Trust your gut and follow your intuition. I will at this point go inside and ask myself, "Is this light or is it heavy?"  Light is an expansion or an opening. It's your truth; it's a "yes". Heavy is a contraction or a dropping of your energy. It's a lie; it's a "no" .  My eyes actually kind of roll up or roll down as an indicator for me. This question is how I live my life. I "follow the light." That means I allow higher consciousness, source energy, or God show me the way.  It works every time I have to make a difficult or tough decision.

5. Lighten up and take the dating approach. Sometimes we make things  life and death, when they're not. I tell my clients to "date" the plan for 6 months. That length of time allows you to get momentum and continually re-calibrate by making powerful decisions along the way. This time enables you to assess if the decision your made is working or not.

6. Make a "re-assessment" of how it's working out every 2 weeks. This helps you tweak what needs to be tweaked, so the decision has a better likelihood of working out. Don't be afraid to try something new just because you don't want to be seen as a "failure". We all have false starts and nothing is a failure when you learn from it and make adjustments. Success only comes from the attempt, not the thought.  Make the attempt and assess regularly along the way whether it's working or not.  

If you are struggling or really stuck in an area of your life, I am happy to help you clear your sabotaging beliefs that will cloud your judgement and keep you in indecision. Unleashing momentum is one of the benefits of the work I do with women. You can grab a free conversation and "test drive" of the work I do here.

Let me know how this process helped you in making that tough or difficult decision, in the comments down below. I know it's made things easier for me!

Bambi Thompson is a brain coach for anxiety transformation and success acceleration. She teaches entrepreneurial women how to leverage brain science, mindset, the human energy body, and the Law of Attraction to dismantle limitation and unleash power, confidence, and momentum.