You Don't Need an Answer. You Need Better Evidence.
Why thinking longer doesn't always make a decision easier.
You've Probably Thought About It Enough
Have you ever noticed how easy it is to mistake thinking for progress?
You tell yourself you just need a little more time.
A little more clarity.
One more conversation.
One more article.
One more weekend to think it through.
So you keep turning the same question over in your mind.
“Should I retire?”
“Should I move?”
“Should I finally take that trip?”
The strange part is...
a month later, you’re usually thinking the exact same thoughts you had on day one.
Not because you’re bad at making decisions.
Because your brain is trying to answer a question it doesn’t have enough information to answer.
And no amount of thinking can solve a problem that’s missing evidence.
Your Mind Can Only Work With What It Knows
Imagine someone asked if you’d enjoy kayaking.
You could spend six months making a list of reasons.
Read reviews.
Watch videos.
Talk to friends.
Compare brands.
Or...
you could spend one Saturday on the water.
One afternoon would probably teach you more than six months of thinking.
Life works like that more often than we realize.
You don’t know if you’d enjoy that trip because you’ve never taken one.
You don’t know if you’d like living in a smaller town because you’ve only driven through one.
You don’t know if you’d enjoy having more free time because you’ve never protected a whole day without filling it.
Sometimes we’re waiting for certainty when what we really need is one new experience.
Not a bigger decision.
Just better evidence.
Let Your Life Help You Decide
I’ve started wondering if we put too much pressure on ourselves to know the answer before we’ve gathered enough information.
Maybe the first step isn’t making a decision.
Maybe it’s giving yourself something new to learn from.
Instead of asking,
“Should I move?”
Spend a weekend in the town you’ve been thinking about.
Instead of asking,
“Would I enjoy having slower mornings?”
Protect one Saturday and find out.
Instead of asking,
“Would I like writing?”
Write for twenty minutes every Sunday for a month.
You don’t have to decide your future today.
You just need to know a little more than you knew yesterday.
Sometimes that’s enough to make the next decision feel surprisingly obvious.
Not because you finally thought your way there.
Because you lived your way there.
I’m curious...
Is there something you've been trying to think your way through that might be answered more easily by one small experience instead?
— Floyd