I wonder if it would help for you to try to satisfice. You’re not trying to choose the best option, you just have some minimum acceptable standard, and you’re trying to pick one of the options (any of the options) that meets that standard. You could pick more-or-less randomly, or you could look for any inclination in favor of one of the options and then go with that one.
For instance, if there are 4 movies that you’re trying to choose between, and all 4 seem like movies that you’re likely to enjoy, then it doesn’t really matter which one you pick. You just need to pick one of them. There are a few ways to do this, some more random, some using more general rules or heuristics which can be used for many different kinds of decisions since they apply to the decision-making process, not the particular content.
Just pick one of the movies. Don’t think or try to come up with reasons, just select one. Maybe your selection will be influenced by preferences of yours that you’re not aware of, or maybe it’ll just be random. Doesn’t matter, you picked one.
Decide you’re going to pick one, and then wait until something good about one of the options comes to mind and pick that one. It doesn’t matter what it is—it could be some good feature that it has, or just a vague feeling.
Pick randomly. Label the options 1-4, look at a clock, and take the minutes mod 4.
Let someone else decide. If you’re going to watch the movie with a friend, tell them “any of these 4, you pick.” Even if the decision is only for you (e.g., you’re going to watch the movie alone), you could still ask someone else to pick (or give a recommendation) if they’re around when you’re trying to decide. Just ask “what do you think?”
Try to guess what the other person would prefer. If you’re going to watch the movie with a friend, ask yourself which of the 4 he would like. Try to do this quickly, with pattern-matching and associations (“this one seems like his kind of movie”), not reasoning. As soon as you have an inclination towards one of the options, go with it.
Try to guess what you would prefer, treating yourself as if you were another person. Ask “which of these would MixedNuts like?” and use pattern-matching and association.
Try to predict your decision. “If MixedNuts had to choose between these movies, I bet he’d go with that one.” (Or, based on past behavior in terms of going home for the weekend, and what’s scheduled for this weekend, I bet that he will go home this weekend.) Then just do that.
Variety-seeking. See which of the options is something that you haven’t done much of in awhile. e.g., I haven’t seen many comedies lately, so I’ll pick the comedy movie. (Or, I’ve been going home a lot lately, so I won’t go home this weekend.)
Does this work in reverse, with a bad feeling about all other options?
I don’t know. If you’re feeling stuck, and not particularly motivated to do anything, I generally think that it’s good to try to find and feed positive motivations to do something. Avoidance motivations (for rejecting bad options) could just keep you stuck. And we want to keep things simple—one of the keys to all of these procedures is that you just need one option to stand out (positively) for whatever reason—you don’t need to go through every option to rule all but one of them out. But if there are only 2 options and you do get a clear feeling against one of them, then maybe it is okay to base your decision on that—it’s equally simple (with only two options) and it does get you through this decision. So I wouldn’t aim to find a bad feeling, but if that was the first feeling that came up then you could go with it.
Ask someone else
I do that as much as possible, but it fails more often that not. Polite bastards.
You could try alternative ways of getting other people involved. e.g., Have them list the pros and cons of each option, and you listen and see if one thing jumps out at you. Or you could describe the options to them, with instructions for them to try to guess which one you’d. Or maybe just talking about the decision can help you clarify which option you prefer.
Though variety-seeking contradicts the others, and conflicting rules are Bad.
True. You may want to forget about that one if it could interfere with the others. There are ways to integrate it with the others, if you determine ahead of time when it applies. For instance, there may be certain domains where you want variety/balance. Or you may sometimes feel like you’re in a rut and want to mix things up, and then you can decide that starting now I’m going to make variety-seeking decisions (until I no longer feel this way). The important thing is that when you’re faced with a particular decision, you don’t need to decide whether or not to seek variety because you have already determined that.
But variety-seeking is more of an advanced technique which you may want to skip for now. It’s probably best to pick one or two of the heuristics which seem like they could work for you and try them out. Over time you can expand your repertoire.
Might be helpful to set up meta-rules. In any given situation, a hierarchy of which rules apply, or which to fall back on if the main ones are inconclusive. For example, variety-seeking could be one of the low-ranked options, seldom used but still significant for it’s tendency to shake up the results of other rules.
I wonder if it would help for you to try to satisfice. You’re not trying to choose the best option, you just have some minimum acceptable standard, and you’re trying to pick one of the options (any of the options) that meets that standard. You could pick more-or-less randomly, or you could look for any inclination in favor of one of the options and then go with that one.
For instance, if there are 4 movies that you’re trying to choose between, and all 4 seem like movies that you’re likely to enjoy, then it doesn’t really matter which one you pick. You just need to pick one of them. There are a few ways to do this, some more random, some using more general rules or heuristics which can be used for many different kinds of decisions since they apply to the decision-making process, not the particular content.
Just pick one of the movies. Don’t think or try to come up with reasons, just select one. Maybe your selection will be influenced by preferences of yours that you’re not aware of, or maybe it’ll just be random. Doesn’t matter, you picked one.
Decide you’re going to pick one, and then wait until something good about one of the options comes to mind and pick that one. It doesn’t matter what it is—it could be some good feature that it has, or just a vague feeling.
Pick randomly. Label the options 1-4, look at a clock, and take the minutes mod 4.
Let someone else decide. If you’re going to watch the movie with a friend, tell them “any of these 4, you pick.” Even if the decision is only for you (e.g., you’re going to watch the movie alone), you could still ask someone else to pick (or give a recommendation) if they’re around when you’re trying to decide. Just ask “what do you think?”
Try to guess what the other person would prefer. If you’re going to watch the movie with a friend, ask yourself which of the 4 he would like. Try to do this quickly, with pattern-matching and associations (“this one seems like his kind of movie”), not reasoning. As soon as you have an inclination towards one of the options, go with it.
Try to guess what you would prefer, treating yourself as if you were another person. Ask “which of these would MixedNuts like?” and use pattern-matching and association.
Try to predict your decision. “If MixedNuts had to choose between these movies, I bet he’d go with that one.” (Or, based on past behavior in terms of going home for the weekend, and what’s scheduled for this weekend, I bet that he will go home this weekend.) Then just do that.
Variety-seeking. See which of the options is something that you haven’t done much of in awhile. e.g., I haven’t seen many comedies lately, so I’ll pick the comedy movie. (Or, I’ve been going home a lot lately, so I won’t go home this weekend.)
Ooo! Good advice is good! Thanks!
I do that for decisions that don’t matter much (e.g. picking a movie). It’s more problematic when I know I will regret picking the wrong one badly.
Good idea, thanks. Does this work in reverse, with a bad feeling about all other options?
I do that as much as possible, but it fails more often that not. Polite bastards.
All good ideas, thanks a lot! (Though variety-seeking contradicts the others, and conflicting rules are Bad.)
I don’t know. If you’re feeling stuck, and not particularly motivated to do anything, I generally think that it’s good to try to find and feed positive motivations to do something. Avoidance motivations (for rejecting bad options) could just keep you stuck. And we want to keep things simple—one of the keys to all of these procedures is that you just need one option to stand out (positively) for whatever reason—you don’t need to go through every option to rule all but one of them out. But if there are only 2 options and you do get a clear feeling against one of them, then maybe it is okay to base your decision on that—it’s equally simple (with only two options) and it does get you through this decision. So I wouldn’t aim to find a bad feeling, but if that was the first feeling that came up then you could go with it.
You could try alternative ways of getting other people involved. e.g., Have them list the pros and cons of each option, and you listen and see if one thing jumps out at you. Or you could describe the options to them, with instructions for them to try to guess which one you’d. Or maybe just talking about the decision can help you clarify which option you prefer.
True. You may want to forget about that one if it could interfere with the others. There are ways to integrate it with the others, if you determine ahead of time when it applies. For instance, there may be certain domains where you want variety/balance. Or you may sometimes feel like you’re in a rut and want to mix things up, and then you can decide that starting now I’m going to make variety-seeking decisions (until I no longer feel this way). The important thing is that when you’re faced with a particular decision, you don’t need to decide whether or not to seek variety because you have already determined that.
But variety-seeking is more of an advanced technique which you may want to skip for now. It’s probably best to pick one or two of the heuristics which seem like they could work for you and try them out. Over time you can expand your repertoire.
Might be helpful to set up meta-rules. In any given situation, a hierarchy of which rules apply, or which to fall back on if the main ones are inconclusive. For example, variety-seeking could be one of the low-ranked options, seldom used but still significant for it’s tendency to shake up the results of other rules.