How to Make Good-Enough Decisions

Even the “wrong” choice can be better than staying frozen

I was halfway through a Reddit post on the channel “r/careerguidance” when I realized I’d read it before. Not just once. I’d read this exact thread at least three times. I even remembered some of the commentors’ handles. But until this moment, I never questioned it. Like of course I was re-reading the same posts at 1 a.m. about whether to quit my job. Of course reading this again was going to magically give me the courage to do it.

This wasn’t research; it was a loop. And no amount of scrolling was going to tell me what to do.

Most of the time when we’re stuck, we believe there’s a definitively correct decision. Our job is to excavate until we discover it — like we swallowed the answer and it’s lodged somewhere in our belly, if only we could reach far enough down to grab it. So we poll everyone: friends, family, therapists, even strangers on the internet.

When someone tells us what to do, we don’t even listen. We argue. We explain why our situation is different. We ask someone else. We don’t take action. Because we’re not actually looking for advice. We’re looking for a guarantee.

But there is no objectively “right” decision. And even if you make the “wrong” one, in almost every case you can make new decisions that alter your path. It’s not as though you step onto a suspension bridge called “Wrong Decision” and life cuts the cables. (I like to picture the bridge in “Shrek,” over a boiling lake of lava.)

We think we’re deliberating about whether to quit our job, break up with our partner, or have a child, but really we’re trying to decide whether we’ll be happy, whether it’ll be worth it, and whether we’ll regret it. So, if you think about it, we’re not making a choice. We’re trying to know the future.

The problem is you can’t pre-feel your future. You can’t control whether the new job has a toxic boss or the economy tanks in six months. You can’t know whether you’ll find love again until you find it again. The only things you can control are the choice itself and how you respond to what comes after. We can only make choices based on the information we have at the current moment. Playing Monday-morning quarterback is pointless (and masochistic).

Not making a decision has costs. It also has a payoff, which is why we keep doing it. When you don’t decide, you don’t have to be responsible for the outcome. You get to keep every possibility alive. Like a perpetual Zillow browser, you can fantasize about a seemingly infinite number of houses without ever having to empty your bank account or deal with the leaking roof.

Eventually, you have to live somewhere. You can’t build a life in your head, and the cost of not deciding eventually becomes heavier than the risk of making the wrong choice.

At a certain point, more information doesn’t clarify, it paralyzes. Psychologist Barry Schwartz calls this the paradox of choice. The first ten conversations (or Reddit threads) may be helpful, but by 25 you are hearing the same themes and spinning.

So how do you know when you’ve crossed from research into avoidance?

You have enough information when you can articulate your fears clearly, you understand what you value most, and you’ve considered the practical realities. If you’ve been through this cycle at least twice without learning anything new, you’re not looking for information. You’re looking for permission. And nobody can give you that.

Here’s the exercise I give my clients: Take a piece of paper and split it down the middle. On one side write “Costs,” on the other write “Payoffs.” Do this twice — once for making the change, and once for staying in place.

Ask yourself, what is this indecision costing me? Think about all the time, energy, opportunities, and sleep you’ve lost spinning. How is it preventing you from showing up fully in the life you currently have? Is your self-trust eroding? What’s the payoff of not deciding? You might be avoiding responsibility, the unknown, grief, judgment of others, failure, or even success.

You’re never going to feel 100% sure. I quit my job and started my practice when I realized a greater part of me wanted it than didn’t. I figured, if companies can make decisions with a majority stake, even just 51%, that should be good enough for me.

So I signed a lease. The AC broke twice that summer. I thrifted furniture and took some from my parents’ basement. I spent half my days running downstairs to let clients in because people kept locking the front door to the building. The landlord sold the building while I was there, so I had to scramble to find a new office after a year. Nobody on Reddit could have prepared me for any of it, and even if they had, I wouldn’t have listened.

You don’t learn what you need in a lease until you’ve signed a bad one. You don’t know what you can handle until you’re handling it.