Decision Fatigue Is A Real Thing

Baby steps to help you reduce the number of decisions you need to make in a day.

I recently spent 10 days in the bush with a group of 16-year-olds. On this expedition, my role, as the accompanying adult was really just to make sure they didn’t do something stupid! Otherwise, the kids voted in 2 leaders for the day who guided the team through all the main decisions. I wrote a couple of articles about the experience, but I only briefly commented on the joy, for me, of only having few decisions to make each day.

Every day the kids decided:

For ten days, my only decisions were when to drink water, go to the toilet, and when to apply sunscreen or mozzie repellant! I found it peaceful and relaxing to just surrender and have no investment in any outcome.

The contrast to my daily life was stark when I got back. The decision making starts from the time you open your eyes until you close them again at night. What time to set the alarm, whether to exercise before or after work, meditate or journal, have I got time to put on a load of washing before work, what to eat for breakfast, what to pack for lunch, do I need to buy anything for dinner on the way home tonight, what to wear to work… all in the first half an hour of waking.

With the number of decisions we make in a day, it’s no wonder we are constantly exhausted from so much thinking!

Initially, after my time away, I found this decision making quite overwhelming so I started…

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