7 I The Best Online Education System in the world
MAKING RIGHT DECISIONS
Marian Baltazar
Class of 1980, University of the Philippines College of Manila
AB Political Science
In this God-given life we are in, we always combat the thought of wandering if we are making the right
decisions in our everyday dealings in life? Questions arise such as, “Are you stuck in circles of solving the same
problem over and o...ver again, or are we being rational in solving our problems to come up with a decision?
Sometimes we come into a realization that we have reacted to a decision that seems to have worked before
when we are confronted with a problem, only to find out that this situation has recurred a dozen of times
already. There are a lot of instances wherein people worry too much about what to do to the point of wreaking
havoc with your mental health. When you reach this point, it seems that you are not really up to making a
decision and consequently it makes a mess out your life.
At times people tend to be emotional to a point that their decisions are being affected. There are instances
when we try to rationalize our emotions and come up with a dodgy decision. To be able to come up with the
right decision, we have to consider and learn from our past experiences, that is, according to the different
decisions that we have already made. Therefore, this allows us not to commit the same mistakes that we had in
the past. Actually, it is very probable that you may never know how to make the right decision or if what you
just decided on is really the absolute right decision. At the end, you were still happy about that decision of
yours. Thus, ambiguous situation comes about and you end up having a bad decision, but you are still at the
brink of wanting certainty. Whereas, you know pretty well that there is no reason or that you don’t have a right
for you to expect something good to happen.
Here is the twist, some researches show that you would be better off not to think about whatever right
decisions to make. For that matter, when decision making gets tough, don’t dither, but instead trust your gut
instincts. As a matter of fact, researches shows that snap decisions prove to be better than endless pedantic
pondering. Sometimes you are at your best when you are given no time to linger and you are forced to rely on
your subconscious in order for you to arrive at a right decision. Almost always your conscious logical brain does
not always make the logical decisions.
Then when we think too much about a decision to make, it leaves us to be even worst than ever. Therefore
we should also trust our human instinct, don’t you or would you want to give it then a try. Do not brood too
much about a problem or whatever troubles you. Trust your instinct to lead you to make a right decision.
Questions for discussion:
1. Do you ponder for a long time thinking of whatever decision you have to make? Why?
2. Do you trust your instinct? How?
3. Can you cite a situation wherein you played deaf to all the advices you have received and just relied on your
instinct? Explain your answer.
4. How can you come up with a clear decision and make a right one?
5. Are you always confronted with having a bad decision or a good one? Justify your answer.