frustration

Decision Fatigue is Real – Let’s Make it Easier

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Decision fatigueTired of struggling to make the “right” choice?

If you’ve ever stared into the refrigerator hoping that a dinner idea will magically appear, or struggled to decide which task to tackle first off of your to-do list-you are not alone. It’s not because you don’t know what to do, and it’s not laziness, it’s your brain “waving a little white flag, especially if you’re juggling ADHD, high expectations, or have a habit of putting everyone else’s needs first. The more decisions you have to make in a day—big or small—the more drained you feel.” 1  That’s decision fatigue.

Decision Fatigue

Every day we wake up with a certain amount of mental energy and each decision or choice we make uses up some of that energy. So, as the day goes on and our decisions start to add up, our mental energy decreases. That’s when decisions become harder to make and so you might put off making them, or feel stuck, or make a hasty decision you’ll regret later.

Give Your Brain Space to Breathe

The first step is to reduce the number of choices you need to make each day. That will free up some of that decision making energy for you to use on the more important things and give your brain space to breathe. Think about how many decisions you are making just to get up and out in the morning. (Ex. What time to get up, what to do first, what to wear, what to eat, etc.)

How to reduce the number of decisions? Simplify the choices you have to make early in the day and create routines that become automatic habits that no longer require mental energy.

Where to Start?

Start with the easy things that don’t take much brain power at all that you can do the night before. Things like deciding what you will wear, what you will eat for breakfast, what you need to bring with you, etc. If you set out what you can, then that part of your morning will go smoother.

The next phase would be to simplify what you can by planning ahead. Where do you feel the frustration building? For me, it was often around dinner. I was all out of decision making power by the time I was supposed to start working on dinner. I would stare into the fridge or pantry and hope something would jump out – it rarely did. Now, I use a blank calendar on the pantry door to write in the meals for the next week. Usually, it goes from Thursday to Wednesday so that I can get what I need on Thursday at the grocery store. When I am creating the menu, I put anything that I might need on the Alexa shopping list. It’s not perfect but it does have an added advantage….if I am not home or am on a call, anyone else can check the menu and get started on dinner.

Other ideas you might want to try is to designate certain days of the week for certain activities like admin, meetings, grocery shopping, errands, laundry, etc. That way you know when something will be taken care of and don’t have to try and fit it in when it becomes urgent on a very busy day.

Creating routines can also help to take the strain off of your brain. Yes, it can be boring to do exactly the same things in the same order every day – but you are saving your decision-making power for more important decisions later in the day. A morning routine and an evening routine would cover the basics but you can also create an end of the work day routine, a weekly reset routine, or even a bedtime routine with the kids and be instilling great life skill habits in the process. Once these routines become autopilot, your brain can relax and save it’s energy for more important things.

Take a look at the times of the day or the things that seem to cause more stress in your day and figure out if a routine would help, or if you can simplify it or do it the night before or even delegate it. The choice is yours. If you feel like you’re just “burnt” at the end of the day, then it’s time to also look at your self-care habits to make sure you are getting enough sleep, exercise and healthy meals. After all, you are worth it.

Take 5 minutes today to set up one “go-to” or default option – a quick breakfast option or an outfit you feel great in, whatever it is, set it up and try it out. Let us know on our facebook page, the impact it has.

*1 Chatgpt definition

3 Steps to Solving Your Organizational Challenge

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Happy 7th Anniversary to me! Seven years in business that is. Today starts my eighth year but today is also important for another reason. It is the same day many, many years ago that I decided to get organized. I remember feeling overwhelmed and frustrated and started looking for information. I started devouring anything I could find on getting organized. Back then there was not a lot of information out there. Today, if you Google “get organized” you’ll get 32,800,000 hits in .34 seconds. That’s a lot of information!

The “get organized” business is a lot like the “diet” industry – everyone has their own ideas and they may or may not work for everyone. So how do you decide what to do?

Here are the first three things you should do:

1. Find the root cause. What is it that is really bothering you or causing a problem? Keep asking yourself questions until you can get to the root of the problem. For example, paying a bill late – why does that happen? Is it because the bills are mixed in with the pile of mail and aren’t seen? Or is it that it gets moved from table to counter? It could be, but it’s more than that. Is it because there is no plan of when to pay them? Probably.  The system to handle the bills is missing and needs a few things. So, once the problem is narrowed down you can proceed to step 2.

2. Analyze your options. Figure out all the possible things that might solve the challenges that you discovered in finding the root cause above. Then write down anything and everything you think might have a positive impact in resolving the problem. Then go back and pick two or three things you can do to solve the challenge. To continue with our example, let’s find a home for the mail by using a basket or bin or mail sorter bin, but keep the bills separated by putting them in their own basket. Then decide on what a “bill paying” plan or process might look like. (Do you need a chart to list the bills, or to put a reminder on the to do list? You get the idea.) Analyze your options and decide what changes would have the biggest impact.

3. Try it out. It takes three weeks (sometimes longer) to create a new habit but you should know in a few days whether or not your new solutions are working. You may have to “tweak” it to improve it, but don’t quit if it doesn’t work perfectly the first few weeks. Keep asking, “What can I do to make this work better?” Then try that. Keep trying until you solve it – here’s where you can “Google” to get specific ideas related to what you are trying to change. Using our example, maybe we see that adding “pay bills” to the to do list isn’t helping. Continuing to look for solutions, maybe you try deciding to pay bills every Friday and put that in your planner.  Or maybe you set up all your bills to be paid online through your bank. Whatever you decide, go back to question one and see that it has solved the original problem. If so, then move on to the next challenge.

Just remember to keep it simple. Good luck!