Every decision you have made in your past has led you to be living the life you are living right now. The big decisions and the small decisions – they all count. It’s really important that you understand this because, in exactly the same way, the decisions you make today will determine the results you live tomorrow.
If you want to see different results in your life, you are going to have to have a good, hard look at the decisions you make each and every day.
The problem is that, today, in a world where instant gratification is the driving force for so many people, individuals don’t want to take responsibility for the long-term consequences of their short-term decision making. Instead of accepting results as an outcome of their own decisions, people look to blame someone else. Their parents. Their boss. The government. The economy. Anyone – rather than facing their own part in not taking responsibility for what they can take responsibility for. The poor decisions they have made.
So, what is a poor decision? Well, that my friends is simply about how well the decision is aligned, or not aligned, with your future goals.
If your goal is to lose 10 kilos, then eating that piece of chocolate cake could be considered a poor decision. Pretty obvious, right?
Well, not obvious for the instant gratification person. Common justifications for their poor decision usually go something like: “I’ll be exercising later.” Or “I have been good all week.” Or “It’s just this once.”
And funnily enough, when they aren’t losing the weight they want, they will blame their metabolism, the people who served up the food, their parents, their genes, the sugar industry – or anyone else they can think of, rather than taking responsibility for being the one who decided to put the cake in their own mouth.
What about financial decisions? If your goal is to put money towards saving for a home deposit but instead you give in to the temptation to upgrade to the latest version of a smartphone for one of your kids, then I would call that out as a poor decision.
Of course, when people do something like this – and this is a pretty common example – the justifications for why this is the right decision will come pouring forth from their mouths. Just try telling a parent that spending over $1,000 for a phone for their child is a poor decision. Watch what happens.
The bottom line is that those people will be $1,000 further away from that deposit. OK… so it’s only $1,000. That’s small fry when you consider the amount of savings you actually need these days. (This is an example of one of the justifications I refer to above that you would most likely hear, by the way). But, just as the parents ‘justify’ this $1,000, I can guarantee that there will be many, many more poor financial decisions that the parents will continue to make, and continue to justify, and that will continue to keep them from reaching their savings goal.
The harsh reality is that by giving in to short-term, instant gratification, people sacrifice long-term benefits.
It’s time to be a grown-up.
Stop kidding yourself. Stop looking outside of yourself for someone to blame or for someone else to take responsibility on how your life will be.
If you want to see different results in your life, it’s time to start taking responsibility for each and every big and little decision you make every single day.
Short-term gratification versus long-term benefits. The choice is yours. The responsibility is yours and the results are yours.
