Prisha Khimavat

This is part of a writing challenge. Read more about it here.

Choices, choices, choices.

Option A, Option B, Option C…Option Z708 and so on and so forth.

In today’s day and age we are spoilt for choice. Every single day, every second, we are surrounded by so many options. When to wake up, what to wear, how much to dress up, what to bring with us, what to eat, if to eat, to eat at home or grab something outside, if outside then where, what to get off the menu, do we want extras or sides, should we eat at the restaurant or get it to go, what about a drink? SO MANY OPTIONS.

With such a multitude of choices to make even before actually eating breakfast, it’s truly evident that we make hundreds of choices every single day. In fact, I have to set aside almost thirty to forty minutes each morning just to make decisions like what I’m going to eat for breakfast, if I’m going to bring a snack with me and what I’m going to wear. I realize that that might sound like a gross exaggeration, but I’m not kidding. I genuinely plan to wake up about forty minutes earlier than I need to so that I have an ample amount of time to make my decisions and some cushion time, in case I run late. I am an extremely indecisive person, and I struggle to make simple choices. In fact, if you’ve ever invited me somewhere last minute and I’m late, there’s a high chance that I struggled to make a choice about some minute thing and thus pushed everything else further back. Though I like to claim that I’ve gotten better about it, the truth is, I’ve just accepted that I take time to make decisions and found a way to give myself that time to do so.

Now, I fully recognize that this is not a healthy way to deal with indecisiveness and that many people strongly suggest limiting the number of choices we make each day. However, the fact of the matter is that for many people, limiting choices is difficult, and even when deciding which choices to limit, there is a lot of choices. My point is that in a regular person’s day to day life, there are a lot of choices and a lot of options. Thus, making a truly informed decision is genuinely impossible, causing immense stress and frustration. This concept is often referred to as the Paradox of choice.

Paradox of Choice – Having too many choices, limits one’s freedom.

So, for instance, you’re standing in the cereal aisle trying to decide what cereal to pick. If you were to try to make a truly informed decision, you would have to read and examine the nutritional value and flavor profile of each and every cereal, and then compare them to one another, perhaps by categorizing them and then eliminating them one at a time. Before you know it, the store clerks and security guards are “politely” asking you to leave the store because you’ve been there all day and haven’t bought anything, in fact, you haven’t even budged from the cereal aisle. Do you see a problem with that?

Aside from the fact that there would be large crowds gathered in cereal aisles, a major issue is that making the best choice is, in fact, one of the most inefficient ways of making choices. So, more often than not, we settle for “eh, good enough.” So, if we were to walk into the cereal aisle again with this attitude, it might look a little more like this. Oh, I like chocolate flavored cereals. Here they are. I remember Monica telling me that this one tastes great, but Anne said this one tastes pretty good too. Huh, oh look Anne’s cereal seems to be healthier than Monica’s. Alright cool, Anne’s suggestion it is. And that’s that. That whole exchange usually takes about thirty seconds to a minute and then you’re off to the next item.

Now, I don’t mean to be saying that one method is better than the other, but rather just pointing out that though we might expect people to make every choice based on the best, most informed possibility, it’s often not the case. More often than not, we save this in-depth analytical process of decision making for more life-changing decisions and opt for the “eh, good enough” approach for most other choices.

There are definitely benefits and drawbacks to each method, but I just find the comparison of it extremely interesting. At this point, in thinking about this concept, I have done essentially no research on the matter and am speaking purely from personal experiences. I’m excited to read more about this and see how choices affect different people and how they choose to deal with them. I would love to hear from you about how you make your daily choices too. I think it’s a fascinating subject, and I’m glad I CHOSE this word for today! (even though I didn’t actually pick it and someone actually suggested it, but that’s not the point. Just let me live my life and enjoy my ending okay! I’m choosing to ignore this now.)

~ Prisha Khimavat ~

Duration: 36 minutes and 53 seconds