We all live different lives, none of us have the same life. Some people are living the life of their dreams, some people are in pursuit of living the life of their dreams, some are struggling in their life, some are living the life one can’t complain about while some others are contended & satisfied with their life. Some are extremely successful in whatever they do in their life and some are hardly surviving in different areas of life.
Now to many of us it may look like that some people are gifted or some people have great luck, and some people are simply just out of luck, but if you look into it deeply and analyze without any emotional influence you will realize that it is not exactly so. The fundamental difference between a person who is successful in his actions and the person who is struggling to get what he or she want in life is just one thing that is DECISION MAKING. A person who is successful knows the process of decision making and does it with efficiency and a person who is not so successful does not understand the function in its totality.
Decision making is part of our daily life, whether it is about deciding to change a job, getting a cup of coffee or tea, deciding to marry someone or staying single, getting up from bed in the morning or hitting that snooze button, decision making is something we do every single day, every single hour, every single minute and may be every single second. The decisions we take on daily basis determine what type of life we live and these decisions are influenced by our state of mind. The more our state of mind is clear and our emotions are stable the more precisely we take decisions.
But often in our life we come to certain situations where the process of decision making creates a lot of conflict in our mind. This creates unnecessary stress which further negatively influences our decision making ability and that negatively influences the quality of our life. Generally such situations require us to take some strong decisions that can shape our life in a completely different way. Maybe it’s about marrying someone we love, taking admission in a college or choosing a career path, starting a new venture or quitting your job for your passion or anything like that. Such decisions are very impactful in terms of how our future life will be but also these situations creates a lot of conflict in our mind which further influences our decisions and that further influences our life. In order to have a life the way we want we need to understand the conflicts these situations create in our mind, so that we can take decisions with much more clarity and confidence.
According to modern psychology there are three types of conflicts that we generate in our mind when we are in a situation where we have to make a decision call. Following are those conflicts:
1) Approach – Approach Conflict
When a person is having two or more than two options in front of him or her and all the options are desirable that is all the options are good enough to go with then this type of conflict is called as Approach – Approach Conflict. Imagine that there is a girl or boy in your neighbourhood and you are secretly in love with him or her and there is another girl or boy at your office who also attracts you toward him or her.
Now suddenly one day both of them asks you out on a date and you have to choose between one of them; Approach – Approach Conflict. Or imagine you get a job offer from two reputed companies and both of the companies are offering handsome salary & other benefits and now you have to choose one of them; Approach – Approach Conflict. A conflict that comes in this category creates the least amount of stress and that too doesn’t last long, so it is not something to worry about. Whatever option we choose it is mostly beneficial. However in this situation one must go with intuition.
2)Approach – Avoidance Conflict
When a person is having with him or her just one option and he or she is having dual tendencies toward that option that is that he or she wants that option because of certain reason and also he or she do not want that option for some other reason, the conflict that this type of confusing situation creates is called as Approach – Avoidance Conflict.
Imagine the company you are working in is suddenly giving you a significant amount of raise but you will have to get transferred to a place far from your hometown. Now you want to get that promotion because of the raise but because you will have to leave your city you also are reluctant to accept the offer. Or you want to marry someone you love genuinely but somewhere inside you fear whether it will work or not, you feel you might lose your freedom after marriage and so you are not so sure if you want to marry.
These types of conflicts create a lot of confusion in life and bring useless stagnancy in life. If we don’t make a call it is most likely that we continue with what we are doing and may lose the chance to change our life for good. We mostly get confused by the doubt that whether the decision will bring better for us or it will make our life worst. We tend to take a peek into the future, but the point we forget is that shaping the future is a continuous process and that is done with the actions we take every single moment. Whether we chose the option or whether we don’t, both the situation will have some pluses & minuses. Whatever decision we take we must take with utmost clarity & confidence and once you take it don’t look back and just keep working for the betterment of your life.
This is not some philosophical concept, it is a realistic fact. So let’s say if we decide to quit the job for pursuing our career, what will happen in a year or two completely depends upon what we have done during that period. If we give our 100% we may get the best of the results, but if we get lazy or disoriented the result will not be the way we wanted. The most important thing that we must remember is that mostly all of us are driven by these two emotions, greed and fear, which always keeps us from rising. Fear is considered mother of all negative feeling and when one transcends his or her own fear that is when one realizes his or her true potential.
So in situations like this we must make sure that our decision must not be oriented from emotions like fear, greed, jealousy or any other negative feelings. We can quit our job to pursue our passion or marry someone we love but only if we really want to do it, but if we are marrying someone because our age is going or we see other people doing well in their respective career and because of that we want to pursue the same career then we will be messing with our lives.
3) Avoidance – Avoidance Conflict
When a person is having a challenging situation that is very critical in his or her life and the other options are also not so much promising, this type of situation where a person is having all the undesirable options in front of him or her creates Avoidance – Avoidance Conflict. This is the worst type of conflict of all and in many cases, the situation is very serious. If one is in such circumstances he or she must consider undertake life coaching.
For example, a person may have to choose between low paying tedious job and being unemployed when he and his family is already struggling with finances. A person may have to choose whether to undergo the operation/surgery of cancer and live with the side effects or continue with medication which may make the cancer worse. Continuing the job where one is getting mentally tortured or to quit and become unemployed. Continue to work on an abusive hopeless marriage or get divorced and become a single parent.
If we don’t do something consequential about such situations then not only the situation get worse but also slowly we develop a negative attitude toward life. In some cases people develop suicidal tendencies too. We may feel stuck in such situations as we don’t have any other options, but the fact is no matter whatever situation we are in there is always a way out, our job is to make efforts to figure out that way. The first and foremost thing that makes us move in right direction is to make a wish, a desire, an intention to evade from such situation and then start making efforts right away. It needs some courage to make a decision. Our mind thinks that ‘oh it will be very difficult’ or ‘it is not possible’, but understand this that in such situations the only thing that is difficult is to take a decision to change your life, because the situation is not the problem but your mindset is which got you into that situation in first place and which is now not letting you get out of it.
If we can overcome this counterproductive mindset and decide to work out the situation and put efforts toward it, we will definitely get into a much better place in our life and slowly our mindset will also get more productive & assertive. But as mentioned earlier whatever decision we take it must not be coming from the crust of fear. Make sure when you take the decision your state of mind is clear and you are emotionally stable. Always remember where there is a will there is a way. These are the three major conflicts that we see in our daily lives and mostly such situations play a major role in which direction our life will precede. By understanding such situations and the mental conflicts that such situation produces we can take decisions more clearly and we will be more in charge of our life.
