Paradox of Options

Paradox of Options

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Introduction 

  • It’s very common to hear people of an older generation say ‘I wish I had the options available to you now in my day’, in regards to a whole host of things including career paths, clothing brands and holiday destinations. But I disagree to an extent. I believe that our society has gone too far and we’re now saturated with options – and that having too many choices available to us can be detrimental to our happiness and our productivity.
  • I’m not the first person to talk about the problem of having too my options or having too much choice in our lives. Barry Schwartz wrote an excellent book in 2004 called ‘The Paradox of Choice’.
  • The aim of this post is not to rip off Schwartz’s book or anyone else who has written on the topic, it is to take the key premises of the argument and apply them to everyday life to help show how you can learn and prevent yourself falling into the trap. Hopefully, this should help you strike a balance between considering enough options to make a ‘good’ decision and not considering so many that whichever option you go for you’ll be disappointed.
  • I’ll start by providing an overview of ‘The Paradox of Choice’ and then detail some real life examples before finally exploring how to strike the balance and not fall into the trap…enjoy!

What is the Paradox of Choice?

  • I will be oversimplifying ‘The Paradox of Choice’, missing some themes out to meet my purposes, so I do suggest you read the book as I found it insightful and enjoyable. If you don’t have time or interest in reading the full book then Schwartz has also done a 20min TED talk on the subject which can be found here: https://www.ted.com/talks/barry_schwartz_on_the_paradox_of_choice?language=en
  • The fundamental premise of the paradox of choice is that in today’s society there are so many options that we end up paralysed and unable to make a decision. While the reason we all believe we want more choice and more options is to provide us with liberation, the opposite sometimes seems to happen.
  • Even if you manage not be to completely paralysed by the sheer volume of options, you might still be less happy with the result. This is the case because of three main reasons:
    • It’s easy to imagine making different decision. Let’s say you’ve imagined yourself with all of the options – or at least a sub section of them – and in all these scenarios you’ve been happy with the choice. When you finally choose something and it isn’t as incredible as you expected, you’re left thinking you’re an idiot for not choosing one of the alternatives.
    • Opportunity Cost. You spend all this time and effort deciding which option you really want/need, this is all lost time, you could have spent it with your family or friends or having fun. You’ll kick yourself when you remember this, all subtracting from the decision you did make.
    • Escalation of Expectation. If by some miracle you did make the best choice you’ll have high expectations for next time, to top or at least match your previous decision, meaning you spend more time, effort and worry on it.
  • This depressing picture is only made worse when you remember that humans only have so much brain capacity and time available to them per day. If you spend 15mins choosing a sandwich that’s 15mins less capacity you no longer have for tackling the important things in your life, for example, meeting work deadlines or going for drinks with your friends.

Real World Examples 

  • The sandwich example above is an easy way to articulate the problem, but not a particularly advanced one. Someone could simply say ‘well I’ll just make a consensus effort to not think so much about my lunch tomorrow’, but this would be missing the point, and I’ll highlight this with two better examples:
  • Me buying laptop: there are hundreds if not thousands of different types of laptops out there. In fact, there are so many that for more than 2 years I put off purchasing a new one. When I finally did purchase one I fell into every single trap highlighted below:
    • I imagined me with every single laptop and life was great in every scenario
    • I spent 10s of hours comparing different model specifications
    • I worried I might never want to buy a laptop again if I made the wrong choice

 

  • Investing in an investment fund: I spent an extra 2-3 months moving on from my Stocks & Shares ISA to choosing an investment fund, why? I was overwhelmed by all the options, within Hargreaves & Lansdown there were 500+ funds. I spent hours reading through the funds, looking at past performance, trying to predict the future, time which I could have spent going out for dinner or learning a new skill. When I did finally choose a fund to invest in I spent several weeks comparing the fund with all the ones I didn’t invest in and kicking myself for not picking the one that was doing best that day. If I’d just had a list of 5 or 6 funds I would have saved myself a lot of stress, time and probably only missed out on 0.1% financial gain!
  • The immediate conclusion to reading and understanding this is to say; ‘Sod it. The secret to happiness is low expectations,’ however I think there are a number of lessons you can learn to prevent this pessimistic view.

How to strike the balance? 

  • I believe there are 5 main ways you can prevent yourself hitting the shame spiral when you realise the realness of the paradox of options/choice.
  • Automate what you can. Not everything can be automated, but you’ll be surprised how much can be and the time and stress you’ll save through automation. Here are a few things I have found very easy to automate:
  • Breakfast – I have 2 ketogenic breakfasts that I switch between, no thinking required. I will be doing a future post on my ketogenic breakfasts, so watch this space!
  • Work clothing – Charles Tyrwhitt – I know that 16in collar, 41in sleeve length, extra slim fit shirts fit me perfectly, therefore why waste time and effort looking for different makes of shirt? There are three key reasons:
    • There might not be a better shirt out there for me
    • If I do find better fitting shirt will it be worth the effort? Chances are I’d have to spend at least 1 full day looking at 10+ companies, 50+ fitting types. I – thankfully – have better things to do with my time
    • Next time I put my elbow through a work shirt (seems to happen all the bloody time!) I’ll expect to find a better shirt again, my expectations will have escalated and so will the time and effort associated with meeting them….if they can be met at all
  • Pre-define the things you want to review in detail. I’m not saying that when you consider buying an engagement ring or a house you should only look at a few options, that would be a terrible idea! But by pre-defining these things you will be mentally preparing yourself and setting your expectations to stop you falling into the shame spiral detailed earlier in the piece.
  • ….and if you do fall into the trap, don’t worry about it. Life is a series of experiences and lessons learned, going through that process you’ll learn something to help you from falling into the trap next time. As Samuel Beckett says, ‘Ever Tried. Ever Failed. No Matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail Better.’
  • Learn to stop worrying about things you cannot control. Just as life is too short to kick yourself when you fail, or in this case fall into the trap, life is also too short for you to try and control everything. Learning not to control everything will allow you to roll with the punches and not want to consider every single option before making a choice.
  • Finally, focusing on the big items means you don’t have to worry about the small things… if you focus your mental capacity on making the best choice to get that next promotion then it doesn’t matter if you get the £6 bottle of wine or the £13 bottle. You’ve got to make sure you’re focusing the majority of your effort on the correct things. As the famous phrase goes, no point being a penny saver if you are a pound spender.

Conclusion 

  • The aim of this piece has been to highlight the paradox of options, briefly explain the theory, show a number of examples and finally run through the best ways to stop it being a major issue for you. As Tim Ferriss says, ‘Regret is past tense decision making.’ The key takeaway from this is that we aren’t perfect, by acknowledging the paradox of options exists is 80% of the battle because it’ll allow you to forgive yourself more easily, give you more time day in your day and hopefully leave you a little bit happier!

 

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