Emotions and Decisions
In the speech that Professor Baba
Shiv gave at Stanford University about the importance of emotions in decision
making, he talks about how the emotion invokes passion, confidence, and
extraction. He talked about how not having these three things causes a person
to be indecisive, which leads to more problems down the road.
I would describe myself as both a
great and horrible decision maker. I have no problem making a decision. I am a
very practical type person, so I always tend to decide on the most practical decision…UNLESS,
that decision will somehow affect someone in a negative way or cause them to
look at me in a negative way. Before watching this video, I would have said
that my problem with making decisions was that I had too much emotion involved
and needed to take some of the emotion out. What I realized after this video is
that the emotion just needs to be redirected.
To give an example, there was this
situation I was faced with where I was stuck in the middle of two very good
friends who were married to each other, but getting a divorce. I removed myself
as much as I could from both of them so that I could remain friends with both
while they went through their terrible ordeal. However, things started to take
a turn for the nasty and the child they had together where was the one who was
about to get the raw end in of the deal. I made a decision to speak up about
the things I knew. One parent was using the child as a pawn to simply get what
they wanted out of the divorce, while the other didn’t care as long as they got
the child. Things were heading in favor of the one who was using the child as a
pawn and I simply couldn’t stand by and not speak up. My emotion is what led me
to the decision and I was more confident about that decision than ever before.
Because of my decision to speak up, it completely altered the outcome of that
divorce and the child went with the parent that they needed to be with.
However, on the other side of my
decision making, I was faced with the choice of three different jobs at once.
All of them called me on the same day to offer me a job and I went into full
panic mode. I tried doing a pro’s and con’s list, but that it did not help.
There was no way to determine the weight of each pro or con. All three jobs
were around the same pay, same drive time to work, and same type of duties and responsibilities;
however, I wasn’t sure which one I should pick. I consulted my usual group of
family and friends and still had no idea what to do. My gut told me one thing,
but my brain said another. I went with the choice that my brains said too,
because it was the most practical choice. After just one day of being on the
job I realized that I had made a mistake. I took the emotion out of my decision
making and went with the practical, brain decision and it absolutely did not
work out in my favor.
There have been many, many times
where I have taken the emotion out and went with the simply, practical choice.
Every time I have done that, I feel confident about my choice, but the outcomes
never end up the way I envisioned them going. I think there is a fine line when
allowing your emotions to help with a decision. I think it works well for those
who can let the emotion in, but keep them in check.
Shiv, B. (2013). Decision making.
Retrieved January, 2017. From:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRKfl4owWKc
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