Making choices can be hard; at the risk of hyperbole, it can be tormentous. The fact that choice making can be so difficult and stressful begs a question — after all, making choices is basically just thinking; it shouldn’t be that hard. Some of the factors that contribute to this hardship are fairly obvious. For example, every choice exposes the choice-maker to the risk of subsequent regret, which is a unique mental pain that we, universally, intensly wish to avoid. More philosophically, making a choice highlights the finitude of our lives — every choice made is linked to a list of options that are not made, and will not get to be made. Most concretely, I think that the hardship of choice making stems from the fact that we simply don’t know how to do it. Growing up we learn that it is very important to make good choices. However, rarely if ever, do we get any kind of training that can support developing a reliable method for making good choices consistently. At best, we are tought to rely on analysis of past experiences, estimates of the odds of future scenarios materializing, and the guidance offered by “gut feelings”, or intuition, which leaves a lot to be desired. Understandably, this causes tension which increases as the importance we attribute to the choice rises. The bottom line is that, when it comes to the pursuit of happiness, the common approach to choices making is so woefully inadequate that showing up for the task should be, at best, uncomfortable. If making choices is indeed as important as advertised, a better method must be within reach. It would be a cruel joke if any of the ingredients that are required for making good choices were to never be available at the time choices are made, only to be revealed some time after the choice has been implemented. Since life does not play cruel jokes, this couldn’t be the case. Given that the quality of our choices is very important, everything that is needed to make optimal choices must be available to the choice-maker at the time choices are made. The following explores the logic of such a method. A review of the relevant practice can be found in the Practice section ( https://wp.me/P7aKBB-6h ).
The Choice
The human brain, the most sophisticated object in the known universe, perpetually conducts countless operations with an astonishing precision. A sample list of the brain’s operations includes monitoring and maintaining parameters such as the body’s core temperature, heart rate, blood pressure, blood pH, glucose level, tracking the position of each joint, limb and digit, as well as the the whole body’s position in space and its angle relative to the horizon. The brain monitors, and constantly assesses, the surrounding environment for evidence of threats and attractions, recognizes patterns, stores and recalls memories, generates emotions, produces imaginary scenarios, recognizes potentials, calculates probabilities, integrates new information and develops new skills. All of these (and many more) truly amazing functions are subservient to the generation of the brain’s ultimate product — the choice.
All of the brain’s impressive activity, up to the moment in which a choice is generated, has no external impact. It is non-existent to the outside world. The Choice is the interface point — any deliberate impact a brain can have on the world around it takes place through the implementation of the choices it generates. The Choice is the instrument with which our brains exert influence on the surrounding world. In other words, the Choice is the instrument with which our brains influence what matters — survival, and the pursuit of happiness. Consequently, a good choice can be defined as a choice that exerts a favorable influence on the choice-maker’s pursuit of happiness (and/or pursuit of survival). A bad choice can be defined as a choice that compromises the choice-maker’s pursuit of happiness (and/or pursuit of survival).
Types of Choices
Choices exist on a spectrum that can be divided into three levels (which overlap considerably; the clear-cut distinctions I make are for the purpose of illustrating the relevant points). First order choices are choices that support immediate survival. Second order choices are choices that support sustaining survival. It includes choices that express the universal, inborn wish to minimize pain and maximize pleasure and are subservient to the greater cause of sustaining survival. The third order choices support the pursuit of happiness. Before we bring attention to this type of choice, which is the focus of this work, let’s take a minute to examine some of the principles involved in the first two.
Literal survival threats are, by definition, intense and dramatic. Imagine going into a skid on a patch of black ice on a highway as an example. When this happens, in a flash, 100% of attention becomes consumed by the survival threat (before any physical or mental pain has a chance to register) and the body takes some actions, which may or may not be productive. These actions express instantaneous choices the brain makes, which are instinctual or reflexive. Under such circumstances, with the right kind of training and practice, a brain can make ‘good choices’ such that the reflexive actions increase the likelihood of surviving the ordeal. Otherwise, survival might be compromised or come to an end (of course, one can come out unharmed regardless of the quality of their response, with sheer luck).
Second order choices are in the service of sustaining survival. These choices are abundant relative to the first order choices as, thankfully, confronting literal existential threats is relatively rare. In comparison with first order choices, the process of generating survival-sustaining choices relies less on instincts and reflexes and more on other brain functions such as analysis of present sensory input and past experience, utilization of common sense, and (perhaps arguably) intuition. Let’s examine these factors:
There are two kinds of sensory inputs: Physical sensations, i.e, sensations originating from the body, and mental sensations, i.e., emotions. Both kinds may be painful or pleasurable. Sensory input ultimately drives the formation of choices by repulsion from pain and attraction to pleasure.
For example, hunger — an uncomfortable physical sensation that can easily become painful, normally leads to survival-sustaining choices, manifested by the behavior of obtaining food. We are evolutionarily programmed to experience sweet and fatty foods — foods with high caloric content, as extra pleasurable. Hence, we find them more attractive than bland foods. Consequently, we are, automatically or “naturally”, driven to make choices that express this attraction by a preference for high caloric foods. Conversely, bitter tasting foods are innately repulsive and typically drive avoidance behavior.
The quality of choices of this order is manifested by their impact on ongoing or long-term survival: ‘good choices’ support it, ‘bad choices’ undermine it. A brain that persistently prioritizes the appeal of pleasure and the avoidance of pain — which are focal considerations, over sustaining survival — an ongoing process, is likely to generate ‘bad choices’. Addictions and obesity (with some exceptions; there is more than one way to get there) are examples of the consequence of persistent choices that are driven by preferential attention to pleasure and pain over long-term, sustained survival concerns.
Common sense and data gathered through past experience (of oneself and others) also have a role in generating survival-sustaining choices. Our brains generate a probabilistic assessment of the risk/benefit ratio associated with the various options available to choose from. Under normal operating procedures, options perceived as having a greater potential for cost than for benefit to ongoing survival are likely to be avoided, and vice versa.
Take, for example, an ordinary person who needs to work to generate income to cover their survival needs (e.g., shelter, food, clothing). Based on common sense and past experience, the choice to meet the expectations of their workplace is likely to support their long-term survival; the choice to disregard what they are expected to do on the job is likely to have the opposite effect. Hence, in the context of sustaining survival, the choice to follow the workplace’s rules and meet the job’s demands is a good choice; the choice to ignore this or to extemporaneously quit is likely to be a bad choice, regardless of their feelings about the job. In comparison, in the context of the pursuit of happiness, making good career choices calls for a different process.
Another example — Imagine that you deeply disagree with some of the laws in your state of residence. Based on common sense and past experience, the choice to abide by the law, regardless of your feelings about it, is a better choice than the choice to ignore, and violate, the law. Ignoring the law is likely to threaten your long term survival (at the very least, it is likely to be a threat to your freedom which, as discussed elsewhere, can be considered a requirment for a worthwile survival). In comparison, making good chices in the context of the pursuit of happiness is more involved. It requires generating and considering more options (such as relocating to a place with laws that meet your approval, becoming politically active in hope of changing the law, or cultivating tolerance of laws with which you disagree). Reliance on the survival-supporting choice making mechanism is unlikely to yield the choice that best supports your pursuit of happiness. The rest of this discussion is devoted to making choices in the context of the pursuit of happiness.
As mentioned above, the typical way choices are made is profoundly inadequate for an effective pursuit of happiness. This is how we typically approach making choices in this arena: We start with listing the available options. Next, we examine each of the options and try to predict what will transpire in the future linked to each possible selection. Then we examine the future scenarios created by the imagination and identify the most attractive one — the future in which we believe we will be the happiest. The option behind the most attractive imagined future is then selected and becomes ‘the choice’ we have made.
The way we subsequently evaluate the quality of our choices is in line with the way we make them: When what materializes is indeed to our liking, we consider the choice to have been a good one. When we don’t like what happens after we made a choice, we consider it a bad choice. In general, the more we like it, the better we consider the choice to have been, and vice versa.
Right?
This approach to choice-making is ladened with numerous fatal flaws. First and foremost, it is based on future telling, an ability that nobody has.
Consider the following question: On a zero to ten scale, how confident are you in your ability to accurately predict your future? If you are thinking that the answer depends on how far into the future we are talking about, I agree, it does. So let’s break it down. It is likely that your confidence in your ability to correctly predict a future that is five minutes out is pretty high, perhaps eight or nine out of ten. How about a future that is 24 hours out? Not quite as high, right? How about a week out? Probably lower. Overall, the confidence in the accuracy of the prediction drops sharply as the prediction point is moved further on out into the future.
Our ability to predict a future that is months or years away with any accuracy is essentially zero (excluding the prediction that the laws of nature will continue to operate as they have in the past). Therefore, the confidence in the validity of predictions of a distant future should near zero. By extension, so should be the confidence in the quality of choices that are contingent on the accuracy of these predictions.
The true magnitude, or importance, of our choices is also unknowable. Decisions one may consider trivial, such as where to have lunch (or even which side of the street to walk on on our way to the place we decided to have lunch at) may actually have a huge, transformative impact, that at times — perhaps all the time, goes unrecognized. But let’s disregard this issue. Let’s focus on choices that are generally considered important, or “big decisions”. For example, questions such as should I stay in school or get a job, get married or stay single, have a child or an abortion, buy or rent, get a divorce or stay married, and so on.
The consequences of these “big decisions” unfold over periods that are outside a range of which anyone could have confidence in the accuracy of their predictions. And that takes us back to the problem: If the quality of our choices, i.e., if making goood choices, depends on accurate prediction of the future, making good choices is impossible!
It is simply not possible to make good choices by relying on future-telling prowess, because the future can’t be foretold. When we do rely on our ability to predict the future we, in fact, are just guessing. Denying it is either kidding or deluding ourselves.
“But”, you might be saying, “there is more to my choice making process than future-telling. I also consider such things as past experience (mine and others’), probabilities and intuition.” So let’s examine these factors and how they fit into the decision-making in the pursuit of happiness.
The problem relying on past experience as a source of guidance to choice making is captured by a Heraclitus (the 500 b.c. Greek philosopher) quote who said “No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.” Given the law of impermanence, past experience must be applied very cautiously — things are never the same as they were in the past. Consequently, if we are to be precise, every dilemma is encountered for the first time. Inarguably, past experience is relevant, but its utility is limited. For example, recalling that you liked the food you had at a particular restaurant in the past, may be helpful in your decision-making process when your dilemma is where to eat today. Indeed, there is a higher likelihood that you will enjoy the meal at that restaurant than at a restaurant you did not like. However, it is important to keep in mind that the fact that you had a positive experience in the past does not guarantee that you will like it again. As per Heraclitus, neither the restaurant nor you are the same.
Past experience certainly does not offer anything close to an assurance of the quality of a choice. This is especially so when facing “big decisions” like the ones listed above (e.g., staying in school or getting a job, getting married or staying single etc.). Furthermore, past experience is irrelevant to dilemmas encountered for the first time: If it’s a first encounter, there is no personal past experience to rely on.
Statistical data — the likelihood of something happening (or not), is another factor pertinent to the choice-making process. Statistical data indeed offer useful guidance to decision making, but only when dealing with populations. Statistics is not an instrument applicable to individuals.
For example, if you are a policy decision maker for a health insurance company, your decisions apply to the population insured by your company. As such you must rely on statistical data. If you know that a certain surgical procedure has a 75% likelihood of success, the correct choice is to include the procedure in what your company covers. If the success rate is only 25% you may not offer it to your insured population. However, if you need to make the decision in your own life — whether to undergo the procedure or not, the utility of the same statistical data is not as clear. The actual meaning of the statistical data is that if you had a hundred lives to live (in a hundred parallel universes) and you made the choice to undergo the procedure in each of these lives, the procedure would succeed in 75 out of your hundred lives. A 75% success rate in research is not a guarantee that your procedure will succeed, and a 25% failure rate doesn’t guarantee failure in an individual case. For an individual, if the procedure succeeds it is a 100% success, and if it fails it is a 100% failure, regardless of the success and failure rate in the population. Hence, it is a mistake, and a set-up for disappointment, to consider a high (or a low) statistical likelihood an assurance of a particular outcome for an individual. When we do so we are, again, kidding or deluding ourselves.
Granted, there are decisions in an individual’s life to which statistical data is relevant. For example, if you drive to work most days of the year, and you need to choose between two routs of getting there, if you know that, statistically, one route takes less time than the other it would be prudent to choose the quicker route every time you go to work. That choice does not guarantee that you will get to work faster on any given day, but over a year you will save time. The statistical data applies in this case because, while you are an individual, your more than 300 yearly trips to work are a population.
Let’s look at another example: Current statistical data suggest that around 50% of first marriages in the USA end with a divorce (moreover, estimates are that about half of the marriages that do not end in a divorce are dysfunctional and should dissolve, but don’t, for various reasons). It is a fair statistical statement that only about 25% of marriages are happy unions. As odds go, not so great. But, does this data mean that the right answer (given the option) is, always, to not get married? Hardly. So, as a factor affecting decision making, like past experience, statistical data may be relevant, but it should be applied with great caution.
Lastly, intuition (thanks, FL) which is a somewhat controversial topic. It is difficult to define, identify and measure intuition. It’s definitely difficult to utilize systematically. In my opinion, if intuition has a role at all in the decision making process, it is but a minor one. Intuition (arguably) may deserve attention when present. But given its elusive nature, it cannot be a centerpiece or a necessary factor in the decision-making process.
The Problem of Outcome
As mentioned above, the typical decision making process is based on trying to predict the outcomes that will be generated by the different available options. However, the mere concept of ‘outcome’ is problematic. It triggers two difficult questions: First — when does the ‘outcome’ of a choice become known (as “the outcome”)? And second — what actually shapes the (perceived) ‘outcome’?
To illustrate the first issue, imagine that you are at a party and have had a few too many. You befriend another guest, someone you have never met before. In your inebriated state you are extremely chummy and trusting. Your new “best friend” shares with you, in great confidence, that she knows of a once-in-a-lifetime investment opportunity that is guaranteed, by the end of the coming week, to yield ten times the value of any investment. You are overwhelmed with gratitude and joy for this information. You pull out your checkbook, write a check for all your savings and hand it over, profusely thanking her for her kindness and willingness to share the riches. When you wake up the next day you are horrified as you recall this interaction. You call your bank only to discover that the check has been cashed. You call the person whose party it was but he has no idea who the person you dealt with is. You have no choice but to accept the loss of your life savings! Cleary, a nightmarish outcome! Undeniably, you made a very bad choice. The following days find you grief-stricken and in shock, as you try to come to terms with the full extent of the outcome of the horrific choice you made. The following Friday there’s a knock on your door. And, what do you know — it’s the lady from the party, there with ten times your investment! Obviously, a fantastic turn of events. Your joy is beyond words! The story now has a ‘happy ending’ — a completely different outcome. But which is the true outcome? The one that had you devastated, poor, and rendered your choice horrific, or the one where you are joyous, rich, and the choice you made has turned out to be terrific?
The point of this story is that the perceived “outcome” does not determine the choice’s quality. The quality of a choice is determined when the choice is made and it doesn’t change from there, regardless of what follows (an important enough point to justify using bold font!). In our story, it was a horrific choice when you made it and it will remain a horrible choice, regardless of its perceived outcome.
Our imaginary scenario does not have to end yet. Next, as a result of your newfound wealth you quit your job. Having more free time than you know what to do with, you get increasingly bored and, out of boredom, you start gambling. With that, your use of alcohol gets out of control, and you spend more time with other substance abusing gamblers. You lose your friends and before long, your money. So now, six months after that party, you are back to being broke, but now you are friendless, unemployed, and with a substance abuse problem. Is this now the outcome of your initial choice? Does that mean your choice, which looked like it was a good choice after all, is even worse than you initially appreciated?
But wait, there’s more. You start going to AA meetings. Through your participation in the program you learn thruths about life and about yourself that you had no idea existed. You make new, like-minded friends. Before long you write a book about your experience. It gets published and becomes a best-seller, benefiting countless people. It also puts you back into financial security. Moreover, you have discovered a meaning to your life and are now more content than you could have previously imagined. So, is this now the ‘outcome’ of your original choice?
If so, based on this ‘outcome’, the choice that was at first horrible, then great, than worse than horrible, is now better than good! This is a ridiculous way to go about gauging the quality of a choice. Going back and forth between a positive and a negative assessment, depending on one’s subjective experience at any given moment, robs the idea of the quality of a choice from any meaning.
The quality of a choice is set at its inception. The initial choice (to write a check for your life-savings) in the story was a poor choice when it was made, and it remains poor forever after. The reason it is a low-quality choice has nothing to do with what transpired after its making. It is a poor choice because it was produced by an intoxicated — and thus impaired, brain. Intoxications, by definition, cause a reversible impairment in the brain’s level of functioning and as such, inevitably lead to a reduction in the quality of the brain’s most important product — choices.
As a basic rule of manufacturing, the quality of a product depends on the quality of the generator generating the product. The quality of a choice is a function of the quality of the state of the mind generating the choice. An impaired brain can not produce high quality choices (relative to choices the same brain can generate when not impaired). It may produce lucky choices, but never good choices.
Back to the point, which is the arbitrary nature of labeling a moment as the ‘outcome’ of an earlier choice: Reality is not a set of outcomes that are linearly (or “one-to-one”) related to preceeding choices. Reality is a continuously unfolding, multi-layered flow of events, in which everything is (at least, in potential) interlinked by connections that are, for the most part, invisible. Everything is (at the very least, potentially) interconnected.
Therein lies the second problematic issue with the concept of ‘outcome’: The invisible causal interconnectedness of events further weakens the meaning given to an ‘outcome’. Every moment in each of our lives is shaped (to an unknowable degree) by countless earlier events (arguably, dating back to the Big Bang). In reality, ‘a choice’ is just a single entry into an infinite list of variables that coalesce to shape every moment in existence. The notion that any two events (i.e., a choice and an outcome) are linked in an otherwise insulated, exclusive bond is always a great over-simplification. Ignoring this aspect of reality is, once again, kidding or deluding oneself.
Going back to the story to illustrate the point (one last time, I promise): The lady who took your money at that party intended to disappear with it. However, she abandoned her devious plan because of an unusually vivid dream she had the following night, in which her beloved, dead grandmother appeared and ordered her to mend her ways. The dream, in turn, would not have happened had she not had some mildly spoiled leftover food before she went to sleep… The day after you quit your job a friend was going to offer you to join a start-up venture that eventually became a huge success, but on the way to meeting you to make the offer she got into a serious car accident that forced postponing her plans by six months, at which time you were already into gambling and substance abuse… The accident, by the way, was caused by another vehicle that failed to stop at a red light; that, in turn, was a result of a shoddy brake-job performed earlier that day, by a mechanic distracted from work by an earlier fight with his girlfriend… The book that you eventually published and got you back on your feet would have never gotten the publisher’s attention had it not been for a DUI his teenage daughter was charged with, eventually leading to him accompanying said daughter to an AA meeting where he heard about your work… And so on.
Obviously, a lot more than one’s choices takes place for any ‘outcome’ to materialize. Most of the relevant variables are invisible and therefore, impossible to appreciate and gauge. But they must exist and inevitably play a role shaping reality.
An additional problem associated with the conept of ‘outcome’ stems from the fact that once a choice is made it is impossible to know what would have transpired had an alternative option been chosen. If you choose to take a right turn at the crossroad you will never know what your life would have been like had you chosen to turn left. Once a choice is made and implemented, the impact that the rejected options could have had is forever unknowable. This renders a comparative analysis, which is needed in order to assess the (relative) quality of the choice, impossible to make.
Choices and the Pursuit of Happiness?
Excluding the ‘outcome’ raises the question: what connects our choices and the pursuit of happiness? The actual link between choices and happiness was brought to my attention by a recurring patient peresentation. The features common to these patients are the following: They have been given various psychiatric diagnoses by assorted clinicians over several years preceding our meeting, have not benefited from multiple treatment trials, and the patient is male, raised as a devout Catholic, and is gay. The core issue in these cases is the conflict between their biologically driven life-style choices and their embrace of the Catholic dogma. The destructive consequences to these patients’ pursuit of happiness is tragically evident. As these men taught me, the choices they make as normal sexual beings define them in a way they perceive from their Catholic point of view as hideously vile. The difference between who they actually are, as iti manifests by their choices, and who they wish to be is irreconcilable and unforgivable. Teaching me this lesson my patients have repeatedly illustrated the true power of choices: Choices have the power to define the choice-maker, not the choice-maker’s future.
The expression ‘a defining moment’ points to this important principle. In a ‘defining moment’ a person is defined, not the person’s future. Consider the following abstract example: “The general gave the command to charge, and that was his defining moment.” It is the general that is being defined, at the moment he made the choice to give the command to charge. What the future holds for the general, the armies, and the peoples involved is way outside the scope of his decision.
The choices we make say a lot more about who we are than about what will happen to us in the future. As such, every choice is an entry into the life story of the choice-maker. In other words, each choice you make is an opportunity to make an entry into your own story — the story that tells who you are; the opportunity is to tell the story the way you want it told.
The choice to rob a bank defines the choice-maker as a bank robber. This is so even if the person backs away from the plan at the last minute. Even if no bank gets robbed, once the choice to rob a bank is made, the choice-maker is defined by it as a bank robber.
If a robbery does take place, the robber may live in riches, happily ever after or end up miserable in prison for years, or something in between. But it is not the choice to rob the bank that determines this future. Multiple factors must coalesce to shape what eventually transpires (such as the quality of the robbery plan and its execution, traffic conditions during the getaway, police officers’ proximity to the scene at the time of the robbery, the involved attorneys’ level of competence, the jury members’ attitudes and the judges’ state of mind, to name a few). The one consequence of the choice that stands above doubt and debate is that it defines its maker as a bank robber.
A choice supports the pursuit of happiness when the story it tells about the choice-maker is the story the choice-maker wants told. And vice versa — a choice undermines the pursuit of happiness when the story it tells about the choice-maker is in conflict with the story that he or she wants to tell.
The intent (behind a choice) is very important. The intent defines the choice which, in turn, defines the choice-maker. The general’s choice to charge defines the general in one way if his intent was to protect his people’s freedom, values, and way of life. The same general would be defined in a very different way if the intent behind the choice to charge was to amass financial profit from the ensuing battle. Similarly, the bank robber would be defined in one way if the intent (behind the choice to rob the bank) was to raise money needed to pay for a child’s life-saving operation. The same bank robber would be defined in a very different way if the intent behind the choice was to finance a drug habit and an ostentatious life-style. Clarifying and verifying one’s own intent is a critical part of a mindful choice-making process.
Choices, the Ideal-Self, and Inner Peace
To further understand how the self-defining power of choices impacts the pursuit of happiness we need to consider a psychological construct referred to as “The Ideal-Self”. The Ideal-Self is a construct each of us has in mind. It represents “the best me I can imagine myself to be”. The Ideal-Self may be in center-stage and in sharp focus, or it may be kept peripheral and blurry, but it is always there, part of the terrain of the normal human adult mind.
The quality of a choice comes from its impact on the similarity, or the fit, between the internal construct (i.e. the Ideal-Self) and the external construct (i.e., the actual Self in the real world, which is defined by the choice-maker’s choices). The better the fit that emerges as a result of the choice, the better the choice, and vice versa.
A choice that defines the choice-maker in a way that conflicts with the choice-maker’s ideal-self (i.e., worsening the fit) causes inner tension. This inner tension comes at the expense of the choice-maker’s inner peace. A choice that defines the choice-maker in a way that is compatible (i.e., improving the fit) with the ideal-self contributes to the choice-maker’s inner peace. This is important and relevant because inner peace is very important and relevant to the pursuit of happiness. Inner peace (as discussed earlier http://wp.me/P7aKBB-3C ) is a prerequisite to pursuing happiness effectively.
In summary, the primary link connecting a ‘choice’ and the pursuit of happiness is the impact that choices have on the choice-makers’ inner peace. Good choices (i.e., choices that define the choice-maker in a way that is compatible with the choice-maker’s ideal-self) support the pursuit of happiness by fortifying the choice-maker’s inner peace. Poor choices (i.e., choices that define the choice-maker in a way that conflicts with the choice-maker’s ideal-self) interfere with the pursuit of happiness by causing inner conflict at the expense of the choice-maker’s inner peace.
Where is the Ideal Self to be found? The “blue-prints” of the Ideal-Self is the information stored in one’s value system. Therein lies the connection between values and the pursuit of happiness (the existence of which should not be surprising). The quality of a Choice is inversely related to its distance from the choice-maker’s system of values. Good choices — choices that support an effective pursuit of happiness, are in line with the choice-maker’s values. Conversely, choices that conflict with the choice-maker’s values influence the pursuit of happiness negatively. Consequently, awareness of one’s value-system supports making good choices.
The connection between values, choices’ quality, and the pursuit of happiness exists at the foundations of all religions. Every religion offers its followers a “canned” value-system as a choice-making guidance platform, with the (overt and/or covert) promise that its application will support the pursuit of happiness. Indeed, research suggests that ‘true believers’ (as opposed to the more superficial, or casual, participants) find making choices easier than their nonreligious counterparts. This, in turn, may be associated with an observed lower prevalence of both anxiety (i.e., more inner-peace) and depressive disorders amongst the un-conflicted, ‘true believers’. The same rationale exists for secular morality and ethics.
Putting It Together
The rational choice-making method requires exploring the way in which the choice defines the choice-maker, and the relationship between the choice and the choice-maker’s value system. (A step-by-step Choice Making protocol is presented in the Practice section http://wp.me/P7aKBB-6h .)
This method hinges on a sincere, two-round examination of each of the available options to the dilemma at hand. The first round you should delineate how each of your options would define you. For example, looking at each option you might ask yourself “What would it say about me if this option were to be my choice?” Or, “What would I know about a person if the only available information about them is that they made this choice?” The analysis must also include a careful examination of the intent linked with each of the options. The right choice will be the one that defines you the way you wish to be defined. In the ‘second round’, each of the options should be compared to your relevant values. The option that best fits your value system is the right choice. When done correctly the option that imparts the desired self-definition will be the same as the option that best expresses your values, thus confirming the validity of your answer. (Note that the protocol for Choice Making presented in the Practice section lists a couple of steps preceding the examination of the available options; these are important steps that I will not discuss here, because this chapter is too long as it is.)
At times, the answers to these questions will be readily apparent. Alternatively, they may be elusive and difficult to come by. Regardless, as long as you are honest with yourself, the validity of a choice you generate by using this method will deservedly garner more confidence than a choice you arrive at by future-telling.
From an evolutionary perspective, as a species, we have much more experience dealing with dilemmas pertaining to survival (both immediate and long-term) than to the pursuit of happiness. This, at least in part, explains why our ability to make good choices in the pursuit of happiness is so rudimentary. In addition, the human condition is rife with forces that get in the way of making good choices. These include brain disorders (some recognized as specific psychologic, psychiatric and neurologic pathologies; many others, in all likelihood, are yet to be recognized) addictions (and secondarily, intoxications and cravings), ignorance, fanaticism, and simply, bad habits. The practice of mindfulness assumes the formidable task of negating all of these, offering a path toward developing more effective choice making ability, which is synonymous with a more effective pursuit of happiness.
This section was kindly edited by S.G. Raphaely, M.D., for which I am ever so grateful.
(This section is complementary to the Choice Making chapter in the Practice section, which you can reasonably skip to now by clicking on the following link: https://whatilearnedsofar.com/practice/choice-making/ .)