I once heard my grandfather say that life is very much like a road. As a matter of fact, roads can be long or short, straight or curvy, rocky or smooth. Whatever your life is like, long or short, your path will inevitably run into many different roads. Some roads will take you to a life of felicity, marital union and spiritual mission. Others roads can bring you glory and abundance, or on the contrary loneliness and scarcity. You may always encounter roads to happiness or roads to misery, roads to success and joy, and roads to failure and frustration.
Now if you take a moment to reflect upon your life so far, you will surely identify similar crossroads, deviations and perhaps dead ends. As far as I am concerned, crossroads have always held some sort of fascination mixed with a sense of adventure and perplexity at times. Which way to go out of the four roads ahead of you? How do you make up your mind, especially when you do not know exactly where a particular road will lead you to? There is no guarantee that your decision will be correct, and for some the question may even be whether they should move at all or simply remain where they are.
Don’t Take Anything For Granted In Life
When you take your first step onto a new road, you will never really know where it will take you until you are already on that road. Most importantly, you should know that life doesn’t offer any guarantees. Even doing the right thing does not necessarily translate into happiness. Similarly, you may love someone with all your heart and not be loved in return. Recognition and prosperity do not either guarantee a happy life. In fact, life is such that you have little control of the far too numerous possibilities and potential outcomes. What you do have control over however are the choices you make, and how you decide to act and react to different situations in life.
Go For It!
Remember, life doesn’t offer any guarantee and you never really know if your decision is right or not until you’ve made it. So, my suggestion to you is to dare make up your mind and take your chances. This mindset will most certainly avoid you get stalled in an unpleasant rut.
While a single decision can ruin your life as well as be the start of a new adventure and open more roads, it is always a matter of perspective. You have the choice between living your life or “watching” it happen to you. In any case, avoid taking decisions randomly or taking careless risks.
Live A Life With No Regrets
Obviously if you knew in advance that the decision you are about to make is wrong, you would immediately change your course. And that would be the right thing to do, since nobody with common sense would embark on a road leading to nowhere or very little. But – and that is a big but – whenever you have to make a decision, there’s no way for you to know for sure that this is going to be the right decision. The only way to know is to wait for the outcome of that decision, and consider whether the positive consequences outweigh the negative effects or the other way round.
So the next time you find yourself at a crossroad, consider the following tips to take the best decision possible:
First, get as much information as possible about your situation.
You can only trust your decision when you have clarified your situation. Just like any news reporter, ask the 5 W’s: what, who, when, where, and why. What is the situation? Who are the people involved? When did this happen? Where is this leading? Why are you in this situation? These are just some of the questions susceptible and necessary to be asked because keeping indecisive is the result of lack of information for indecision is the lack of information.
Second, identify and create options.
What are your options? Do you see few, plenty or no options? If you need to, create your own options. Brainstorm. Write down the ideas that come to you and don’t discard anything even if it seems too eccentric or adventurous. Consider enrolling your best friend to help you with the process, but always stay in control and take your final decision by yourself.
Third, carefully analyze the pros and cons of every option.
Evaluate each option by considering its advantages and disadvantages, so that you fully apprehend the consequences of your choice.
Fourth, be confident and decide.
Now that you have evaluated your options, it is time to trust yourself. Remember that there are no guarantees and you will be always be right with the benefit of hindsight. So choose… decide… believe that you are choosing the best option at this point in time.
Once you have made up your mind, the die is cast and you are either on the road to victory or on the road to failure. Only time will tell. But whatever the outcome, do not look back with regret or remorse. This is yet another opportunity for you to learn and grow so that next time you will be able to take a better decision.
To Your Success,
Luc Andria
Founder, QinetiQ Network
Skype: luc.andria
Web: QinetiQ Network
Blog: Luc Andria’s Success Formula
Discover the “Behind the Scenes” Strategies, Techniques and Tools Used by the MLM Heavy-Hitters