Decision-making.
It’s as much an art as it is a science. A discipline we exercise to select one route among many as our preferred path to progress.
Of course, we’re not usually free to make decisions in a vacuum.
We live in a world where we come into constant contact with other people, pre-existing systems, and countless factors we need to account for.
Making good decisions gets even harder when we’re required to look beyond the here & now, and consider the long-tail ramifications of our choices.
Because, although the immediate effects matter, the trajectory we set through our moment-to-moment moves are just as significant.
Put another way – choices compound. Not always in ways we like.
Each fork in the road presents not only a challenge we’re called to solve in service of our present needs, but one that has the potential to influence our future state, too.
Choices which give us an easier today might come to collect their due further down the line.
A price paid now might spare a greater price to be paid later.
That’s not guaranteed. Some decisions that hurt today keep hurting – and a pain-free call doesn’t necessarily need to create future hardship.
Obvious exceptions aside, there’s a principle we can work with here (regardless of the path we want to take).
It’s easy to think that we’ll be able to take each new decision at face value & judge it based on its own merits…
But that’s not the case.
The decisions we made yesterday influence what we can do today.
The decisions we make today will affect what we can do tomorrow.
The choices we make tomorrow will either push us further down the path we’re already on, our put us on a different course.
Way leads on to way. One branch leads to another. Each selection nudges us closer to a future that grows clearer with every passing day.
The solution is simple. But it’s not easy.
When in doubt, whenever we can, we should choose the option that compounds towards the future we want.
One that casts a vote for the kind of future you’re building towards, the person you want to be, and the world you want to inhabit.
The alternative is to subjugate our future existence to our present desires. To cast aside consideration of the bigger picture and hyperfocus on what’s right before us.
If that’s what we want, we’re free to pursue it.
But we shouldn’t walk into it unawares.
Our choices compound. The more we can leverage this insight to our advantage, the better.