Lifestyle World

Overabundance of Options

We live in a time of overabundance of options

 

More is not always better

You don’t just want more rubbish — you want more value

You don’t just want more noise — you want more substance

 

More options can entail greater probability of finding the best fit

This is not always necessary however

There can be no extra benefit coming from the increase in options

There is however cost

 

The cost of overabundance of options is that of energy spent sorting through them and making a choice

The cost may outweigh the benefit

 

Equally attractive options are the greatest trap

Equally unattractive options are the greatest trap

Since they are equal — there is no benefit from analysing and choosing

There is however cost of expanding all that energy and cognitive resources

And then there is the real risk of failing to make a decision at all

 

Furthermore — this overabundance of options creates a belief that there must be a clearly superior option

It’s intuitive to believe that in a large group there is a great variation in quality

But is there, really?

 

Sometimes there exists a far superior option

You will expand your cognitive resources in order to reveal it

The cost incurred will be compensated by the superiority of the option chosen

But how do you decide when it’s remunerative to make a careful choice — and when it’s not so relevant?

 

In the past you only had so many options

Therefore you only had so many choices

Today you have infinitely many options and infinitely many choices

Everything you do, everything you look at — competes for your attention and inundates you million things to choose from

You take each choice more or less seriously — like the species which remembers the great famine

You take each choice more or less seriously — intoxicated by marketing and fallacious belief that there must exist a clearly superior option in such a large group

You take each choice more or less seriously — tempted by the promise of the path of least resistance, tempted by the promise of pleasure

 

It’s clear our instinctual attitude towards DECISION-MAKING is inadequate today

The choices we are faced with every day are insignificant, trivial, stupid

We are beguiled by false possibilities, false advantages, false shine, false meaning

wasting our time choosing the colour of our car, deciding what movie to watch, scrolling mindlessly through abhorrent social media waste, weighting false pros and false cons in a false important decision,

It’s all a distraction

and waste of energy

 

What’s the cure for noise?

SIGNAL

What’s the cure for maximalism?

MINIMALISM

What’s the cure for indecision?

DECISION

 

Set boundaries to how much NOISE and NONSENSE you permit into your life

Set limits to how much time you are willing to waste on insignificant decisions

Minimize your lifestyle, focus yourself

Realize when the optionality is false, when the extra options provide no advantages — and waste no more time on them

Learn to make quick decisions and standing by them

You will be tempted by false promises but don’t fall for that

Always keep your eyes on the prize, don’t get distracted

Know what you want and focus on that — don’t get distracted on thousand false options

Keep it simple, focused

And when you have a real problem — THEN go search for cool solution

When you need an extra option — THEN go looking for options

But resist the glamour of false possibilities — you don’t need that shit

The value is not that which begs for your attention

The value is where YOU put your attention