J. Randal Matheny

... reversible, keep-your-options-open decisions reliably lead to lower levels of satisfaction than irreversible ones. In other words, we are significantly less happy with our choices when we can back out of them.

Why does keeping our options open make us less happy? Because once we make a final, no-turning-back decision, the psychological immune system kicks in. This is how psychologists like Gilbert refer to the mind's uncanny ability to make us feel good about our decisions. Once we've committed to a course of action, we stop thinking about alternatives. Or, if we do bother to think about them, we think about how lousy they are compared to our clearly superior and awesome choice.

This business article has a direct application, in my mind, to marriage. The grass is greener on the other side of the fence when the life-time commitment is lacking. When we make our choice of mate with the thought that there is no going back, the PIS kicks in and we see all the reasons why we made the right choice. What do you think about this one?

If you can't decide about something, it means you lack enough information to feel comfortable making some choice. Therefore, the next-action coaching question would be, "So what action do you need to take to begin to get the information you need to make that decision?" Nine times out of ten, there's a specific action to take, such as "surf web re: xyz" or "e-mail A & B to set meeting to explore options about xyz."

Every once in a while, though, the information you need has to come from inside—i.e. your intuition. You need to sleep on it. But even then, to really clear your head, you need to make the decision about how long you can "just sleep on it" until you feel like you need to actually make the Big Decision. Two weeks? Two months? Four days? Six hours? Whatever that answer is, you simply need to park a trigger in a calendar or tickler file to yank your chain at that point, ensuring that you re-assess the situation in your own timing.

Sometimes it's not a lack of information, but motivation. And strategies exist for that lack as well. There is hope.