Three decision-making tools to help you respond instead of reacting to stimuli
Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our answer. In our response lies our growth and our freedom. Viktor E. Frankl
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Our Mind
My mind is a great thinking machine that I both use and misuse. I sometimes operate subconsciously (react) and sometimes consciously (respond) and last but not least, I make informed decisions (thoughtfully.)
Sigmund Freud describes our mind as an iceberg, with the more significant underwater part representing the unconscious mind and the part you can see above the surface as our conscious mind. He describes the interface between the two as the preconscious mind. He further differentiates the conscious mind as the one whose activities we are aware of and the unconscious mind as the repository of old feelings, urges, biases, and automatic behaviors.
Reacting
When we react without thinking, we are in our unconscious mind and jump to erroneous conclusions. For me, this often happens when I see a person I know out of the context I met them in, and I jump to the conclusion that I don’t know and become embarrassed when they have to remind me who they are.
We react from our unconscious mind when we assume someone is talking about us or doesn’t like us based on their behavior. We jump to this conclusion not based on fact but our unconscious minds jumping to the wrong decision.
To get into our conscious mind, rather than reacting, we need to pause and take a breath before we respond.
Responding
Responding differs from reacting in that we move from our unconscious mind alone into our conscious mind but still be aware of what we already know subconsciously. There is time, even if only a split second, to pause before we respond in almost every situation. A response comes more slowly. It is not an instantaneous jump to a conclusion. For example, Tuesday, I was driving in my lane, and another car started to enter it without room. I reacted, slamming on my brakes and hitting the horn. A response might have been more like stepping on the brake and ignoring hitting the horn.
Another example is when I lead a group, and I may think I did a lousy job because I mispronounced someone’s name and didn’t feel good about how things went. But when someone comes up and says it was a good meeting on their way out, I respond “thank you” rather than letting feelings react to the situation.
Now let’s consider an even slower response. You respond but only after giving it thought and evaluating the pros and cons.
Decision Making
Decision-making requires the most time in developing a response because it requires a lot of thought. You need to determine the effects of your response on many levels, for example, who will be affected positively and who will be affected negatively. Then it would help if you considered the 2nd and 3rd generation of effects or, as I call it, the ripple effects. Decision-making tends to be a more formal process depending on the complexity of the situation.
For example, the design of what I need to pack for Thanksgiving week in Kansas is more complicated than what I will wear today. So in the second example, I need to look in my closet and select something. In the first example, I need to research the weather, what I will be doing while there, and how thin my blood has become living in New Mexico.
There are many decision-making tools to help guide your thinking. A few are listed below:
- You can use pros and cons to answer a question like should I move from my two-bedroom to a one-bedroom apartment.
- An Eisenhower matrix can be used to determine such things as which activity I should do next, one that is a high priority- low effort or low priority low effort. First, you build the matrix by creating a square divided into four sections, with one axis being the priority and the other being the effort required. Then you place the activities into each area and evaluate which to do first.
- The large business method is to build a matrix with bidders down the side and then the features you are looking for one per column across the top. Then you can either have a team independently fill out the matrix and combine the scores to come to a conclusion or do it yourself.
The whole you
The whole you should be moving to a mindset that responds rather than reacts. A mind that practices informed decision-making. We want to wholly embrace the concepts of being mindful in a world of chaos. We want to think before responding. It would be best if you accepted that you are responsible for acting and reacting and realized that you could change yourself.
“The remedy for speech that is false is speech that is true. This is the ordinary course in a free society. The response to the unreasoned is the rational; to the uninformed, the enlightened; to the straight-out lie, the simple truth.”
Anthony Kennedy
