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How to “Describe a Time You Had to Make a Difficult Decision” in an Interview

Anyone can talk up their skills in a job interview, but hiring managers usually want a little more proof than “trust me, bro.” So they’re likely to ask behavioral questions that require you to walk them through one of your past experiences, so you can talk about how you’ve used the skills you’re claiming to have.

“Describe a time you had to make a difficult decision,” for example, asks you to do this in a way that provides them a bit of insight into how you handle tough choices and how you work overall. Like all interview questions , it gives you a chance to show the interviewer you’re the right person for the job—as long as you’re well prepared.

Why interviewers ask you to “Tell me about a time you made a difficult decision”

“Every job has conflict and challenges” that require you to make choices big and small, says Muse career coach Tara Goodfellow , owner of Athena Consultants . So asking you to describe a time you had to make a difficult decision can “help an interviewer understand a bit about how you process and solve dilemmas,” Goodfellow says. “It’s not so much about the actual situation, but the resolution and how a situation is handled.” Basically, your interviewer wants to see that you can not only approach decisions thoughtfully and make choices in a clear, logical way, but also explain your considerations and ultimate call.

Interviewers will be on the lookout for red flags in your answer. “It also can be telling when an interviewee blames others or doesn’t hold herself accountable,” Goodfellow says.

Look out for alternate phrasings of this question as well, such as:

• What’s the most difficult decision you’ve ever had to make?
• What’s the hardest decision you’ve ever made at work?
• Tell me about a time you had to make a difficult professional choice.
• What are the most difficult decisions?
• Tell me about a tough choice you’ve had to make in the last year.

Tips for choosing the right “difficult decision” to talk about

The “difficult decision” you discuss should:

• Be about a professional experience. Your interviewer isn’t asking about deciding which party to attend, where to vacation, or even how to deal with your annoying coworker. Stick to the work itself. If you’re an entry-level candidate, “You can pull from an internship, team, volunteer, and/or project experience,” rather than previous jobs, Goodfellow says.
• Actually be a difficult decision. Something like choosing which email to respond to first on a normal Monday won’t cut it. “It doesn’t have to be that you came in and identified a million dollar error,” Goodfellow says, but it should have some significance or impact, even if it feels “small.”
• Show off your decision-making and problem-solving skills . It might seem obvious, but you should choose a story that allows you to demonstrate how you made a decision. Don’t choose a time that you picked which new client to pursue first by flipping a coin. “You want to convey that you thought through the options,” Goodfellow says. Did you research each choice? Consult your manager or someone with more experience in this area? Make a pros and cons list?
• Not imply that you can’t do the job. Don’t make it sound like a routine part of the role you’re interviewing for will be excruciating for you on a daily basis. “If you’re going to have to engage with customers and you state you get nervous every time a customer asks you a question, that is a red flag (and I’m not kidding, I’ve had this as an answer),” Goodfellow says. One exception to this is if you choose a story from further back in your career about a decision that was difficult at the time, but now that you’ve had more experience you’re an expert or “go-to” person in these kinds of decisions, Goodfellow says.

Examples of difficult decisions to talk about in an interview

If you need some help thinking of situations that might fit these guidelines, here are some types of decisions you could talk about:

• Choosing where to make cuts in a team or company budget
• Deciding how to allocate funds
• Selecting which employee or employees would be laid off
• Deciding to let go of an underperforming or disruptive employee
• Choosing a longer-term strategy for a team or company to pursue
• Creating a product roadmap with many tasks in need of prioritization
• Deciding how to use limited resources
• Deciding to pivot careers
• Choosing to take a pay cut for a new job
• Figuring out how your team was going to approach the COVID-19 pandemic
• Deciding whether you or your team would work in the office, remotely, or using a hybrid model
• Selecting between two or more possible pitches or strategies
• Choosing a health insurance company or plan to offer employees
• Deciding how you’d deal with a conflict at work
• Choosing to speak up about a situation that created a toxic work environment for you or others
• Choosing to speak up about how you disagreed with a company or team policy or decision
• Deciding how to prioritize larger goals or KPIs
• Deciding to leave a job that wasn’t working out for you professionally
• Choosing between two enticing job offers (in the past, i.e., not during your current job search!)
• Prioritizing two competing deadlines or projects
• Deciding which team member gets a promotion or other opportunity

If you’re in the first two years of your career, you might also talk about an experience like:

• Choosing your major
• Deciding what school to attend—if your choice came down to academic programs or educational or professional opportunities
• Figuring out what you wanted to do after graduation
• Choosing what extracurriculars to join
• Making tough decisions as a leader or officer of a club or activity
• Deciding how to allocate club, activity, or event budgets
• Deciding to take an internship offer

How to answer “Describe a time you had to make a difficult decision”

Here are some steps to follow as you prepare and construct your answer:

1. Choose a relevant decision to talk about.

Your answer to this—and every—interview question should be relevant to the position you’re applying to, Goodfellow says. The best way to do this is to carefully study the job description and figure out the types of decisions you might have to make in this role. You should also think about what problems you’re being hired to solve. “You want the answer to resonate with your interviewers,” Goodfellow says, and you want to show them that you can “solve potential pain points they have.”

For example, if you’re hoping to get hired for an event planning position that involves a lot of budgeting, you might want your answer to involve a tough choice you had to make about how to allocate funds. If you’ll have to make a lot of choices about directions for future marketing campaigns, you might talk about how you decided between two great but very different campaign ideas at your last job.

2. Explain which kinds of decisions are difficult for you and why.

Once you’ve chosen an appropriate situation, you’ll want to articulate why it was a difficult decision for you, so your interviewer can glean more insight into who you are as an employee and what matters to you. Interviewers are “interested in what you deem challenging and how you resolve it,” Goodfellow says. “Both pieces need to be shared with some detail.” 

So for example, if interviewing for a client-facing job you might say something like:

“For me, any decision that has the potential to negatively affect a client’s trust in our business relationship is difficult because as an account manager, I know that that trust is paramount. But unfortunately, sometimes things change on our end or, for some reason I didn’t know about earlier, I can’t deliver on everything promised.”

3. Tell your story in a clear, concise way.

Walk an interviewer through your experience in an organized way. One of the most common ways to do this is the STAR method . STAR stands for situation, task, action, and result. Here’s how it works:

Situation: Lay out the situation for the interviewer, with just enough specific detail that they understand. To continue our example from the previous section:

“My company offers complimentary in-office training on our software in the first month after you sign up for one of our enterprise-level packages. However, one time, I was informed that there was only availability for one of my two new clients to receive this in-office training within the first thirty days after signing.”

Task: Say what your role in the story was. In this case, explicitly state which decision you had to make. For example:

“I had to decide which of my clients would get the training in the promised time period.”

Action: What did you do to help you make your choice? For this question, interviewers are most interested in your decision-making process, so that should be emphasized the most.

“I wanted to know everything I could about each client so that I could try to predict which would benefit most from the earlier training. I looked back at our communications. One of the clients was a newer tech startup that rarely emailed me unless I contacted them first and didn’t ask any questions. Meanwhile the other client was a more established marketing agency that often contacted me with questions from their employees about how to use our software.

“Since they were both such new clients, I also set up a meeting with the account executive who’d closed each deal to get more insight. The AE who’d signed the tech startup said they’d been a quick and easy sale until it came time to actually sign the deal and suddenly they had a lot of questions about what was actually included in the level they’d agreed to. The AE had realized that their contact hadn’t been speaking with the team members who would actually be using our software until just before they signed the deal. Meanwhile, the AE who’d signed the marketing agency said that selling to them had been a longer process where they’d asked a lot of detailed questions along the way but by the time they agreed to sign they were enthusiastic.

“I realized that the lack of questions from the tech startup may have been because they hadn’t run into any problems, but given what had happened during the deal signing, it also could indicate that there was no firm avenue for the employees using our software to ask questions—and these employees may have been waiting for the training to get help and start using the program in earnest. However, the marketing agency was always passing questions along to me—indicating that they were willing and able to get their employees the answers they needed before the training took place.”

Result: What choice did you make and what was the outcome of your decision? If you have specific numbers or examples to back up how you made the right choice, be sure to include them.

“I decided that the tech startup would get the first training because I had no indication that the contact we had at that company was passing along employee inquiries. And I knew the marketing agency’s employees were already using and getting comfortable with our software and had a way to get their questions answered in the meantime. I approached the marketing agency first, let them know the issue, and offered to book them the first available date in their second month. They appreciated how forthcoming I was. They’re still a client two years later—at a higher package level than their first year with us. The tech startup reported back that their employees loved the training and they’re also still with us, but now even more forthcoming with questions because the employees felt they connected with us at the training.”

Another “Describe a time you made a difficult decision” example answer

Here’s one more example answer for a candidate without professional experience.

“When I first started college, I used to have difficulty making choices about what to prioritize because I tend to want to learn and do everything. And as a computer science major , a lot of my classes involved group projects. During one semester, I had two large projects that I was working on simultaneously for my cybersecurity and web development courses. Each project had sections to them that would have been more challenging for me and required me to learn new things, along with one or two sections that wouldn’t be as much of a time commitment for me since I’d be honing skills I already had. My natural urge is to try to learn something new whenever possible. However, that just wasn’t possible to do with both projects at once and I needed to decide which project I should volunteer to do a more challenging section of (and spend more time on) and which one I should take on a more familiar section of.

“ I first checked both syllabi and found that each project was worth the same percentage of my grade and confirmed I was on track to get roughly the same grade in both classes.

“ So at my first meeting with each group, I asked my teammates what aspects they were interested in and most skilled at and what else they had going on. I found that each group had someone who could dedicate more time than I’d be able to if I chose to take on a more challenging part of the other project. Plus, there were group members on each team who had more experience and familiarity with the portions of the projects that were new to me and who might be able to complete them without a lot of strain.

“ I had to ask myself which project was going to be the most useful for my education and career goals, and the answer there was definitely the web development class—as you can probably tell from me applying to this job—so I took on the section of that project that I considered most challenging and that would allow me to learn something new. For my cybersecurity class, I volunteered to take on a portion of the project that was similar to things I’d done in the past.

“Both projects turned out well—we got As for both. But the knowledge I gained from the web development project really solidified my desire to focus on front-end web dev for the long term. I also learned that I can’t do it all and applied similar methods for prioritizing future projects, and I can now make these choices much more quickly.”

Literary Crisis: Why a Dilemma Will Make Your GOOD Story GREAT

by Joe Bunting | 13 comments

You've turned to literature in times of crisis and dilemma, but have you considered how important a crisis or dilemma is in literature?

After you finish writing a book, you should be proud. You're probably excited. Visions of publishing dance in your head. But then you go back and read your story or novel or book, and you think, “Well, this is good and I feel proud of it. But it doesn't match up to the stories/novels/books I know and love.”

You wrote a GOOD story, but not a GREAT one. Worse, you don't know why. In this post, I'll explain exactly what to look for to make your good story great.

Note : this article contains an excerpt from my book The Write Structure , which is about the hidden structures behind bestselling and award-winning stories. If you want to learn more about how to write a great story, you can get the book for a limited time low price. Click here to get The Write Structure ($5.99).

How I Wrote a GOOD but not GREAT Book

A couple of years ago, I finished the memoir I had been working on for over two years. After I finished, I read it, and while I thought it was ok in some parts and really good in others, there was something missing. It was GOOD but definitely not GREAT.

And I had no idea why my book wasn't working. I spent a month trying to figure it out. That month turned into two, which turned into four. I still hadn't figured out what was wrong.

Honestly, there were moments when I thought I would never figure it out. I worried the book would never be published, that the years of work would be wasted. I thought about all the readers waiting for the book, how flaky I would look when I told them that I had decided not to publish the book because it wasn't any good. I was sinking into depression over it.

My author friends couldn't understand why I didn't just publish it. “You'll write another book that will be better. Just publish this and get started with your next one.” It was good advice. I knew that if I were in their shoes, I would say something similar. But even as I didn't know how to fix the book, I couldn't let it go either.

The Secret to Great Books

I had a breakthrough when I went to the Story Grid workshop in New York City led by Shawn Coyne. He's Steven Pressfield's editor , the author of The Story Grid , and the creator of the Story Grid podcast .

I went to the workshop skeptically—attending mostly because my friend Tim Grahl was helping to run it. I had read the book before and listened to a few podcast episodes, but I honestly wasn't expecting to be radically transformed by the workshop. I've been studying writing and storytelling for over a decade. I thought I might get a few good tips, but I didn't believe Coyne or anyone else would have that much to teach me that I hadn't heard before.

I was wrong. The workshop completely changed my writing and editing process. Since then, the Story Grid has become a constant when framing working the structure of my story.

I also finally knew why my good book wasn't great. I finally understood why my story wasn't working.

My story lacked a dilemma, what Coyne calls a crisis

Definition: What is a Literary Crisis or a Dilemma?

A literary or story crisis, also called a dilemma, is a the crucial moment (or moments) when a character is confronted with a significant choice that will change the trajectory of their life.

I find that people get confused with the term “crisis,” though, so in  The Write Structure   framework we call this element the dilemma.

You may have heard that in a good story your protagonist must make a decision . I knew this, but what I was lacking was how to set up that decision. The dilemma is the moment where your protagonist is placed into such a tight spot that he or she has to choose, and importantly, that decision carries so much weight that there is no turning back from it.

This choice represents how a character is forced between opposing forces, internal or external, and the only way to move forward is by making a difficult decision.

In other words, a dilemma is drama.

Why a Dilemma Is the Foundation to Your Story

Have you ever been reading a book when you find yourself thinking, “There's no possible way this character can get out of this situation! This is just too bad. They're in way over their head, and there is no getting out of it.”

THAT is a literary dilemma. And readers love this moment. Why? Because we want to know what happens next!

A dilemma sets up a knowledge gap, and readers become desperate to fill that gap. It's in moments like this that readers are tempted to skip to the last page in the book just to find out if everything turns out ok (not that I've ever done that, of course).

Where Dilemmas Happen in Your Story

Every scene must have a crisis. Every act must have a crisis. And every book must have a crisis.

Crises are the foundation of your story.

Crises are questions, they're dilemmas, and since they're happening in a character's head, they usually occur “off screen.” In other words, they're implied but not specified. BUT you the writer still need to know what the literary crisis is in every story you write.

Where does the dilemma occur? The dilemma occurs directly in the middle of your story, specifically following the last complication that occurs in the Rising Action , or an action or revelation that forces the character, probably the point of view character, into a crisis decision. In The Write Structure framework, it looks like this.

• Exposition . Life as normal.
• Inciting incident . There's a problem.
• Rising Action or Progressive Complications . The character attempts and fails to deal with the problem.
• Dilemma . The character must make a difficult choice to deal with the problem.
• Climax . The character makes his or her choice and the climax is the action that follows.
• Denouement . The problem is resolved (for now at least) and a new normal is established.

A good example of this is the film Gravity (which is amazing, if you haven't seen it). Sandra Bullock's character's problem is that everything is trying to kill her. The progressive complications get worse and worse until *spoiler alert* everyone is dead except for her.

This is where many writers would stop. They would show her struggle to survive and resolve it by eventually getting to a place where she does, in fact, survive.

But what makes this story GREAT rather than good is that her character reaches a dilemma. Finally, it becomes clear that she is definitely going to die. She is faced with a best bad choice situation: take her life into her own hands and end her own life OR keep fighting to survive even though she will suffer and almost certainly die anyway. (If you've seen the film, this is that moment when George Clooney reappears.)

This dilemma is so important because it gives the character the chance to make a choice. Fighting for survival isn't a choice. Who wouldn't fight to survive? But when it becomes easier to stop fighting than it is to just die , then it leads to the crisis.

The Two Types of Dilemmas

In The Story Grid , Coyne says crises are always a choice that your protagonist faces, and they come in two easy-to-follow formulas:

• Best Bad Choice . The best bad choice crisis is easy to understand. Just think of that game “would you rather.” You're given a choice between two horrible things. Which do you choose? For example, would you rather leave the love of your life at a party with another guy, or let her humiliate you as she flirts with him? See? Drama, right?
• Irreconcilable Goods . There is another, somewhat less stressful way to create a crisis. Irreconcilable goods are two values that don't work together. For example, love vs. money. Both are good, but like oil and water, they don't mix. Another example: you get into your dream college, but if you go you have to leave your high school love. Other examples: comfort vs. adventure, personal happiness vs. the happiness of others, and success vs. family.

You can recognize these situations in your own life, right? We've all been through these crisis moments, and the choices we make in the midst of them carry outsized consequences when compared to most of the little decisions we make in our lives.

In my own writing, I use these two formulas to write great scenes , but also to audit scenes, stories, and even whole books I've already written to make sure I'm setting up a big enough story crisis.

For example, in the memoir I wrote, I realized it wasn't working because I didn't have any clear dilemmas. Things just happen . I didn't set up clear literary crises, and therefore the choices my character was making didn't matter. Since the book is a memoir, I couldn't manufacture story crises, and so I had to pull them out of my actual experience.

One that I discovered in the first act of my story was a Best Bad Choice dilemma. In Paris, I wanted to live the “writer's life,” where I hung out in cafés, drank coffee and wine, soaked up the atmosphere, people-watched, and wrote my book. But when my readers gave thousands of dollars to make me take on crowdsourced adventures, I had to choose between either refunding them money and being embarrassed or giving up my comfortable, “writerly” trip for an uncomfortable (but maybe more interesting) one.

I was able to take a dilemma that I was experiencing privately and turn it into a literary crisis that centered my story.

Want to see a crisis in action? Watch this. (My favorite is the woman at 7:06.)

Make Your Story Great

Is your story risky enough? Is your protagonist making life and death decisions? Is he or she making decisions at all?

How can you heighten the risk of those decisions? How can you put him or her into a best bad choice or irreconcilable goods situation?

If your character is just going along with everything, your story might be good, but it will never be great.

Get The Write Structure – $9.99 $5.99 »

Have you ever faced a best bad choice or irreconcilable goods crisis? Tell us about it in the comments .

• Does it have a crisis?
• Is it a best bad choice or irreconcilable goods crisis?

Write out the story crisis using one of the two crisis formulas (i.e. best bad choice or irreconcilable goods).

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Happy writing!

Joe Bunting

Joe Bunting is an author and the leader of The Write Practice community. He is also the author of the new book Crowdsourcing Paris , a real life adventure story set in France. It was a #1 New Release on Amazon. Follow him on Instagram (@jhbunting).

Want best-seller coaching? Book Joe here.

13 Comments

This is the EXACT problem with my novel’s first chapter. In my author’s mind, I thought there was a crisis. But when I picked it up one year later, hardly anything resembling real crisis exists. Yikes! Thanks for the coaching, Joe. I’m bookmarking this one and referring back when I’m ready to give that opening chapter a rewrite!

Awesome! I had the same realization about half my book when I first learned this stuff (and I still have this realization but hopefully now it comes a little faster!).

Thanks, Joe. What’s a story without protagonists agonizing over the right thing to do? I want to make a suggestion, however — from my own observations of myself and others in the worst kinds of crises — namely that when “all is lost”, our faith in our own ability to think is also lost. All is not lost if we still trust our own self-interested mind. So, in the deepest crises we abandon even ourselves, the upshot of which is that we finally and truly SEE. So, it’s not a decision, it’s “seeing.” There is no choice involved. Therefore, I see all true crises as a kind of religious experience, and I doubt that anything short of that is going to give the reader their money’s worth. The woman on the ten metre board — she stops retreating because… she SEES herself for what she is and what she can be. At least, that’s the way I see it. What say ye?

I agree with you. There’s a liminal space that is able to be opened up in the midst of a crisis that we/our characters don’t have access to outside of the crisis. Great observation PJ!

Joe…AWESOME video…it pretty much demonstrates how I feel each time I hit the “submit” button for contest pieces to judges! I also noticed something a bit interesting–it appears it’s much more difficult to climb back down all of those stairs than it is to just JUMP! Thanks for sharing.

I also like a good crisis and always want to know what happens… Come to think of it, I’ve never read a book without skipping to the end first. That’s just the way I am. I don’t like surprises. I have to know if anyone is going to die or if everything is going to turn out okay. That way, I won’t be surprised. I still enjoy the book though so it’s never a problem.

I had almost finished my “crisis” comment when I pressed a key and it all disapeared. That’s my current writing crisis as I can’t face writing it all again. Sorry!!

That’s a perfect example of a crisis! Evelyn 😉 :'( you are the character fighting the evil demon computer.

Thenks B. It may be the evil demon, but I will tame it and continue with my writing.

I need to read this article about 3 x or more. I felt like it was me talking when you talked about how to fix your story. This is probably the key I’m looking for. Thanks

Thanks! The video actually helped too, it turns out I got stuck because I didn’t know how to show her having to make the damn choice during the dilemma crisis. and thinking about hat you’ve said in here too of course. Onward with this exciting flash back! (story within a story kind)

Great article and so glad I found it. I’m VERY stuck at the moment and I think is will help me figure it out!

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Difficult Decisions Make Great Stories: Tell How You Made Tough Choices

by Laura Hedgecock | Mar 13, 2014 | How-to , Memories , Writing and Sharing Memories | 0 comments

Even when you regret your choices, your process of making difficult decisions can make a great story (or two).

In Important Life Decisions: Writing your Stories , we looked at how to identify important life decisions to write about. In this post, we’ll look at the stories behind the choices we made.

The story behind a difficult decision can be as important (and interesting) as the decision itself. Great stories result from examining difficult decisions in hind-sight, relating how you arrived at your choices. In fact, this is a common theme among best-selling memoirs. ( Click here for examples .)

Decision making process

One of my favorite quotes when I was a teen was “Not to decide is to decide.” But that was my goal, not my modus operandus . I was more likely to take the path of least resistance than I was to make a touch choice.

How did you approach your decision? Did you inundate yourself with facts? Did you go with your gut? Did you meditate? Did you examine all possible outcome scenarios?

When faced with difficult decisions, do you have trusted advisers that you turn to? When you’re writing about the choices you made, include who you trusted. What was their role? Did you bounce ideas off of them or did they guide you?

Support Network

Often we’re able to make a decision based on the support of friends and family. For example, a relative providing child-care can enable a loved one to go back to school or pursue a new career. A spouse willing to tighten the budget could allow you to take a job you love over one that has better pay. Was your choice facilitated by a support system? How did that impact you?

Remember these?

In some cases, there’s a driving rationale behind a choice. Was this true in your case? This approach is particularly interesting when, in hindsight, you wish you had handled your difficult decision differently.

Higher power

What about spiritual advisers or a higher power? Did you pray about your decision? Did you consult Scriptures? A pastor or other religious leader? How did this help you to discern which choice you should make?

Emotional toll of difficult decisions

The emotional toll accompanying a decision doesn’t necessarily relate to its importance. Just because a decision is a “no brainer” doesn’t mean it wasn’t important. The reverse can also be true. We can torture ourselves over a decision that seems unimportant.

For instance, the decision to support a relative might be easy to arrive at, but could turn out to be a turning point in your life. Similarly, it may be difficult to decide about home renovations, but in hindsight, those decisions seems mundane.

Examining the emotional cost of difficult decisions gives insight into your personality and what matters to you. Did you experience anxiety? Lack of sleep? Dread?

Were you able to let go after the decision was made or did you have second, third, or too many thoughts to count?

What stories of difficult decisions do you have to tell. Please, leave me a comment!

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Nicole Pyles

On My Writing Journey

• Uncategorized

Making Difficult Decisions as a Writer (and Making One of My Own)

I am saying goodbye to my fantasy novel.

This decision hasn’t been an easy one, but since I did complete my novel last year, and reading back over what I’ve written, I have been shocked with how much work would lie ahead for me. A lot of the beginning chapters are years – and years old – and I’m not sure I can put in the work needed to improve this novel. I started this novel as a kid and now that I’m in my mid-twenties, I need to weigh the decision as to whether the time and effort is worth it. I’m not sure it is.

Like I said, I think most of all, I want to continue to grow as a writer. Holding onto this novel at this point feels a little bit like holding onto a crutch. Maybe I’m afraid of letting go. Maybe in some way I feel like I need to hold on as an homage to my younger self that started this journey.

I’ve learned so much and I’m still proud I finished it.

So what’s next? I do have a few ideas under my belt and embracing an idea is a little bit like an embracing a new love. It takes nurturing, time, and attention and while I’m in the bed of another (my fantasy novel of my youth), I could never fully explore a new opportunity and idea.

I haven’t quit put the novel in a drawer in my desk. I do have a plan for it as it’s been part of my growth as a writer. I plan on making into a type of scrapbook and adding my own notes and thoughts on what certain sections represent to me.

One thing is for sure, I have prioritized my life lately. I have found a balance in my blog, my writing and my job. I have more energy now as I am not extending myself too much (you may have noticed I am not blogging as much lately!). I am opening myself up again to the muse that can only be found in being still.

Anyways, I wanted to formally announce this to my writing friends – to you – as a way of marking a new chapter. And you will bet I will blog about that as I go along too.

What difficult decisions have you made as a writer? How do you know they are the right ones?  

If you liked this, check out these:

Related Posts

Finding Stories in the Last Place I Look

The Unfaithful Widow Ten Years Later [Book Review]

16 thoughts on “ making difficult decisions as a writer (and making one of my own) ”.

In response to your question: That's the tricky part. Knowing if it's 100% the right thing is never truly possible. But then dwelling on the decision would in ways be no different than never letting go in the first place.

That being said, it seems you have valid reason for letting go. It's not like you're abandoning it. You plan to use it to grow. I actually quite like the scrapbook idea. Best of luck on your new adventures!

Thank you for your support! I hate not knowing if it's the right decision. But I think as I move further away, I will find greater happiness with my decision. I'll be updating on my scrapbook progress for sure, too!

My first novel began as a series of blog posts and was never intended for print. That was the problem. It was like a jigsaw puzzle and the amount of work I had putting it all together I wondered if it might have been better starting from scratch. I could have done better with the book and knew the second one would be better because it would be written as a novel not as a series of blog posts.

I had the temptation to do exactly what you are considering but that is a waste of so much effort. Start your novel again from the beginning with your original work as a reference guide. It should be easier. You know the plot and the structure so it should all come together a hell of a lot faster and you will have a novel a lot sooner than you will starting a new one.

Something else I did which may not suit you but if it does it could solve the problem, I wrote both my books at the same time. It relieved the boredom of going over the same material from the first book all the time. I would skip between books depending on my mood.

You know, the funny thing is, your comment and someone else's inspired an idea. I thought of a new idea that does use elements of the world I created. It takes on a new plot line, but I feel pretty good cause I'm not entirely scrapping my last fantasy world! So, thank you. 🙂

Cutting and chopping things out off a novel is always a difficult decision for me.

Hugs and chocolate, Shelly

Oh definitely – those are forever a challenge!

Sometimes it's good to let go of something old. Chances are your writing has grown leaps and bounds since you started that novel, and you would probably have to rewrite the whole thing to bring it up to your current standards. I like the idea of scrapbooking it or something. It's a creative work in and of itself, too. I'm not too sure about the difficult decisions as a writer… probably decisions like killing off a character that I like.. that's hard. Or having anything bad happen to my characters at all, for that matter… which can make for some boring writing! Hoping your ultimate decision suits you best.

Thanks Barbara! I think I'm really excited about this scrapbook too. And I just can't imagine rewriting the whole thing. I may use pieces of again for future writings though, for sure.

I've abandoned books before, and it's always painful to do. However, sometimes it's better to recognize it's not up to snuff and the work required to get it right would basically mean starting over. Better to move on to a new project at that point.

Yah it's good to know I'm not the only who has to do this. It definitely isn't easy!

I've shelved two novels, but they weren't completed, so it wasn't as much a painful decision as yours. I think your decision is a brave one, but I also think you will find another project and when you do, it will progress much more quickly than your fantasy novel, only because you are a more experienced writer now than you were when you started.

Wishing you the best of luck, Nicole. You can do it. 🙂 We'll all still be here to cheer in your corner whatever you decide. Just keep writing.

Thank you Diane! I think you're right – my next novel won't require so much out of me and for that I'm grateful.

I put a book in the bottom of the draw last month. It was my first novel. I read the first chapter recently at a workshop and realized it need way to much work to be worthwhile. I may get back to it again, someday. Now, I am so happy to not have to stress about it anymore.

This was exactly my experience – after getting some people to look at it and reading it myself, I just can't imagine going through a rewriting process.

Life is full of trials and errors. We grow and learn. It is good that you have put the novel in a drawer. You've recognized how far you've come as a writer. That's important. Some novel ideas just don't peter out the way you want them too. That shows growth on your part. Sometimes you just have to say enough is enough and move on.

There are definite advantages to moving on. You refresh your perspective. Creativity flows better. You can only try so many times before frustration overwhelms you.

Sounds like you've reached that point. WTG on your decision.

I just have to say you are awesome

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Character Development: How to Write Moral Dilemmas

Written by MasterClass

Last updated: Sep 1, 2021 • 5 min read

When searching for new story ideas, authors often seek plotlines that will hold a reader’s interest and get them to invest in a story’s arc and character development . One way for a writer to promote a reader’s emotional investment is to have their main character face a moral dilemma.

Journal Prompt: An Important Decision

You make decisions every day that affect your life in different ways. Some decisions, such as which movie to rent or where to go on your morning jog, have a small impact, while others, such as which job offer to accept or whether to get married or not, have life-changing implications.  

Look back on a past choice that falls into the life-changing category, and use the experience as a reflective journal prompt .

1.    Think of a specific time when you were at a crossroads and had a significant decision to make. Free-write one page in your personal journal, keeping these questions in mind:

•    When was this? How old were you?

•    What was the context in which you were making this decision? What other factors were important?

•    Why did the decision seem significant at the time? Do you still think it’s important for the same reasons?

2.    Consider the consequences of your past decision. Knowing what you know now, would you make the same choice? Free-write another page, using these questions as a starting point:

•    How did this decision change your life for the better?

•    How did it create challenges or heartache?

•    Why would you stand by your decision, or why would you choose to go in a different direction?

•    What do you think would have happened if you had taken another path? What consequences do you think would have resulted from that option?  

3.    Sum up what this past experience taught you in a short paragraph. Have you used these lessons to make other big decisions? Did you create a “what not to do” script for yourself for future situations? Tell your personal journal all about it.

What is the most difficult decision you’ve ever had to make? Share your experience in the comments.

If you want to learn how journaling can help you tackle  life's challenges and make difficult decisions,   please download the free eBook,  The Journaling Guide to Manage The Stress and Strains of Life .   

Getting to know your true, authentic self is a lifelong journey. Our 23 Days to Self-Discovery self-paced journaling course shows you how to use your journal to know and understand yourself better. 

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From 101 Creative Writing Exercises: Moral Dilemmas

by Melissa Donovan | Sep 17, 2019 | Creative Writing Exercises | 9 comments

Creative writing exercises: Moral dilemmas.

Today’s creative writing exercise comes from 101 Creative Writing Exercises , a book I wrote on the craft of writing.

This book takes you on an adventure through creative writing. You’ll explore different forms and genres of writing, including freewriting, journaling, memoir, fiction, storytelling, poetry, and article or blog writing.

101 Creative Writing Exercises imparts proven writing techniques while providing writing practice and creative inspiration.

Today, I’d like to share an exercise from “Chapter 9: Philosophy, Critical Thinking, and Problem Solving.” This exercise is titled “Moral Dilemmas.” Enjoy!

Moral Dilemmas

We each have our own personal philosophies and values. Our values come from our families, religions, and cultures. They shape our morals and the decisions we make.

People are complex. What we believe is right or wrong changes when we find ourselves in real situations. Consider an honorable character who believes that one’s highest loyalty is to his or her family. Then that character learns his brother is a serial killer. Does he turn him in? Testify against him? Stories get interesting when characters’ morals are put to the test.

The Exercise

For this exercise, you will put a character’s morals to the test. Below, you’ll find a short list of moral dilemmas. Write a scene in which a character faces one of these moral dilemmas and has to make an agonizing decision.

• In the novel Sophie’s Choice , a young Polish mother and her two children are taken to a concentration camp. Upon arrival, she is forced to choose one child to live and one to die. If she doesn’t choose, they both die. Write a scene in which your character must choose between the lives of two loved ones.
• A single woman is close friends with the couple next door and has secret romantic feelings for the husband. She discovers that his wife is having an affair. Normally, this woman minds her own business but now she sees an opportunity to get closer to the man she wants.
• Some countries have strict laws regarding drug possession. A family has traveled to one such country for vacation. Upon arrival (or departure), one of the teenagers’ bags is sniffed out by a dog. The bag is opened, the drugs are identified, and the guard asks whose bag it is. Both parents are considering claiming ownership. Everyone in the family knows the sentence would be death.
• Your character gets to travel through time and face this classic moral dilemma: the character finds himself or herself holding a loaded gun, alone in a room, with a two-year-old baby Hitler.
• A plane crashes into the sea. Most of the passengers escape with inflatable lifeboats but they do not board them correctly. Your character ends up on a lifeboat that holds eight people but there are twelve people on it, and it’s sinking. Your character can either throw four people overboard and eight will survive or they will all die except your character, who will get rescued after the others drown.

During the scene, the character should agonize over the decision and reveal his or her reasons for the choice that he or she makes.

Tips: Search online for “lists of moral dilemmas” to get more scenarios.

Variations: If you don’t want to write a scene, challenge yourself to come up with a few moral dilemmas of your own.

Applications: These moral dilemmas also work as story prompts. They force you to put your characters in situations that are deeply distressing, thus creating conflict and tension.

Wow. The baby Hitler one really bothered me. How could you shoot an innocent baby, even if it does turn out to do what it does? Besides, what if without Hitler things would somehow be different, in a bad way? That would be a terrible dilemma. I have no idea what I would do. I would think that I would go insane with that world changing decision resting on my shoulders.

It’s a pretty disturbing dilemma, isn’t it? I’ve seen this one carried out in TV shows and movies. LOST had an episode that dealt with this issue and the characters took opposing sides. Some were willing to take the life of a child, knowing that he would grow up evil. Others argued that such a thing could never be justified. It’s a great exercise for the brain (and the heart).

Well what if baby Hitler does something horrible to his adoptive family?

This are great and challenging promps. I never thought to have specific moral dilemmas be the center of a story. But it is a great way to create tension and conflict, as you mentioned. I’ll have to try it out.

Rachel, I’m glad you liked these. Enjoy!

Wow! These are some really good prompts. They all give me a lot to think about.

Thanks! Glad you liked them!

If we have traveled back in time to when Hitler was a baby, why not try to adopt him and raise him as a Christian or at least as a nonviolent person? It would possibly save the lives of millions, not just the baby. No one knows how they would handle a situation, in actuality, but in fiction, why not try?

He was raised as a Christian. You can actually find many examples of people raised as Christians (or any other religion) who grow up and do horrendous things. The core of this question is that you have an opportunity to rid the world of a horrible evil but it requires committing a horrible act. Thus it’s a moral dilemma. I understand where you’re going with it, and I admire that your inclination is to cure him of his evil.

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Enda's English Notes

Junior and Leaving Cert English Notes

Write a short story where a character faces a difficult decision.

The cold wind bit ferociously into Bruce’s skin, as he made his way towards the black sedan. 

It was 9 a.m. and he didn’t want to be late picking his only daughter up from the airport. He had let her down so many times in the past, he knew what a terrible father he had been, but he couldn’t do what he did and be a good father, that much was plain to see.

The traffic on Broadway was starting to build and Bruce resisted the urge to use his siren and flashing lights.

A text message woke him from his thoughts, and he punched the steering wheel as he read the words he didn’t want to see. It was Emma and she was landed at JFK. It would take him another twenty minutes at least. He would have to phone her.

‘Hey dad, where are you? It’s freezing.’

‘I’ll be about twenty minutes honey, I promise I’ll get there as soon as I can.’

He heard the inevitable sigh, followed by, ‘always promises with you dad, promises that you never deliver. Just get here.’

And with that the line went dead. Man he knew how to rub her up the wrong way. She didn’t hate him, but he knew she wasn’t far away. 

As he made his way past Penn station, he saw the advertisement for the Knicks game tonight, he thought he might give Ed a call to see if he could hook him up with two tickets. Him and Emma taking in a game, just like old times, just like a normal family, if only for a day.

He was once again interrupted from his thoughts by his phone, it wasn’t Emma this time though, this time it was the office.

‘Jackson,’ he answered in a cool manner.

‘Hey man, we got a problem. Need you here ASAP.’

‘What’s up? I’m on my way to pick up Emma from JFK.’

‘NSA have picked up on internet chatter, I think we have a serious threat on our hands right here in Manhattan, if I were you, I’d be getting Emma the hell out of here,’ replied Bobby.

The last sentence sent a chill up Bruce’s spine and once again the steering wheel bore the brunt of his anger.

‘OK, I’m coming in, but this shit better be for real and not some lame ass internet geek, who lives at home with his mom,’ shouted Bruce furiously.

‘Bruce, we think it’s Asad’s people. We think they’ve been tipped off that we killed him.’

Bruce ended the call. There was no we in killing Asad, it was just him and he was assured that his tracks had been covered. ‘Another bloody mole,’ he roared, again hitting the steering wheel, as he thought about how another informer had managed to infiltrate ATU (Anti-Terrorism Unit)

He quickly formed a plan in his mind, before lifting the phone and calling Emma. As he did so, he hated himself. He brought so much pain and misery to his family, they didn’t deserve this shit. Emma’s only crime was having him as a father. If only her mother was still alive, thought Bruce.

‘Why the hell are you not here yet, Dad?’

‘Listen honey, we got a problem. I can’t tell you what or why, but you need to get out of New York now. Don’t get on a plane. Take the first subway from JFK and get as far from New York as you can. I’ll explain later.’

‘It’s always the same, always a crisis, I just wish I had a normal dad, not the super duper special agent, who never sees his family.’

‘Honey, when this is over we can talk, but right now I have to go. I promise you’ll be safer this way.’

‘Same old promises dad.’

And for the second time that morning, Emma hung up on him. It’s amazing how one man can achieve so much and be so respected by men as powerful as the President of the United States and still not have any respect from his daughter.

With the Emma situation sorted to some extent, he hit the gas, put on his flashing lights and siren and weaved through the New York traffic, just like they did in the movies. As he stormed through each set of traffic lights, his mind drifted back to the Middle-East and to Adi Asad. It was one of the cleanest operations he had ever carried out. Now that he thought about it, perhaps it was too easy.

Asad was yet another Muslim fanatic, trying to gain power in a relatively liberal region. The US didn’t need any more despots in the region, so the hit was sanctioned. He thought it had been a success but now it seemed that it offered a pretext for more extremists to attack America. Like they needed a reason, thought Bruce.

His phone hopped again, as he sped towards HQ. It was Bobby again, hopefully with better news.

‘Bruce, you’re not going to believe this. The chatter was a decoy. They’re ready to strike the city within the hour. The FBI busted two extremists a few minutes ago. From what they can make out, these guys have a canister of nerve gas on the subway.’

Bruce closed his eyes, he knew this day was only going to get worse. Not only had he put Emma on the subway, but he had seen nerve gas deployed in Iraq and knew the devastation it would cause. If it became airborne, hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers would be killed. The fact that it was on the subway made it even worse, it would travel freely through the city, killing indiscriminately.

Bruce knew what had to be done. He told Bobby that he was heading for Penn Station, he would board the subway and try to intercept the canister. Although there were there millions of people relying on him right now, his only thoughts were that of his only child, Emma.

He hit speeds of 90 MPH as weaved through traffic with the precision of a formula one driver. He knew what was at stake, he knew what he had to do. Forty yards from Penn Station, he swerved the car to a halt, jumped out, unholstered his .45 magnum and ran towards the subway. Sprinting at top speed, he flashed his badge at the stunned cop, and told him to get out of the way.

There were hundreds of people queuing to get on the train, totally unaware of how much danger they were in. Bruce pushed through the crowd, trying not to make a scene. He knew that whoever had that canister would be either on that train or about to board. He scanned the area, he knew what to look for. He had spotted many suicide bombers in the Middle-East, there were always tell-tale signs. He knew that whoever had the canister was willing to die because there was no way to escape.

He couldn’t fathom that sort of loyalty, despite the fact that he had put his life on the line for his own country many times. 

The difference he told himself was that he was willing to die to save others, they were willing to die to murder others. 

He was certain that no one boarding looked like they were about to die. He entered at the back of the subway and made his way through the first carriage, sweeping the area as he went. As he entered the third carriage, he spotted a young middle-eastern man, sitting alone with a package. There were beads of sweat forming below his thick black fringe. His face looked innocent, he didn’t look like he wanted to die.

Bruce’s initial swing took him by surprise, as he knocked him off the seat. There were yells from the other passengers. 

‘Federal Agent, stand back,’ he shouted, flashing his badge.

His victim attempted to get back up, but Bruce struck him with an elbow across the back of the head, knocking him unconscious temporarily.

Bruce took the bag and looked inside. There were growing fears among the passengers, as he lifted the silver canister from the bag. 

‘It’s a bomb!’ shouted one of the men, as the crowd in the carriage dispersed, knocking each other over as they clambered to get to another carriage.

Bruce handled the canister carefully, he knew that it would be tamper proof. He picked up his phone and rang Bobby.

‘I’ve acquired the canister, any chance of shutting it down?’

‘Pull back the small latch at the bottom of the canister and tell me what you see,’ Bobby replied.

Bruce slowly pulled back the metal latch and saw a timer in red digits. It was exactly as he feared. It read 1.56. As he stared at it, the seconds continued to drop.

Panicking, Bruce shouted down the phone, ‘this things going to go at any minute man. I have to stop it. What can I do?’ 

‘There’s no way to stop it, but there is a way to isolate the canister. Every train in New York has a sealed compartment for the driver, because they keep getting hijacked. Take the canister to the front of the train and put it in there. But there’s still one problem.’

‘What’s that?’ asked Bruce, as he ran towards the front of the train.

‘The compartment can only be sealed from the inside, so someone has to stay in the room.

Bruce’s heart sank. He knew that he had to die. He knew that the lives of millions of people and more importantly, Emma, depended on him. He raced through the carriages, with Bobby still talking through the ear piece.

‘Bruce you there, come in man.’

‘Yeah I’m here. I know what I gotta do. Bobby when this is over, I want you to make sure Emma is OK and I want you to tell her that I’ll never break another promise,’ sighed Bruce, as he stepped inside the compartment.

‘Bruce, you are the bravest man I’ve ever met, the people of New York will never forget you.’

Bruce cut him off, before saying to himself, ‘yeah they will, but I just hope that Emma never does.’

And with that, the canister activated, but not before the bullet passed through the brain of Agent Bruce Jackson.

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20 Powerful Journal Prompts to Help You Make Better Decisions

Aah! The tragedy of choice! We’ve all been at a crossroads at one time or another. According to the latest psychological research, we make almost 122 informed decisions daily.   While some choices might seem easy, others can be risky or scary to take. You might even get stuck in the “what if” spiral and keep changing your mind. So, what’s the secret to making good decisions? Trust us when we tell you; it takes time and patience to master decision-making! Journaling can help you learn the skill of decision-making. So, next time you have to choose between A or B, try to use journal prompts for decision-making. This post is all about decision-making journaling and how to use it. Let’s dive in!

Does Journaling Help With Decision Making?

Yes! You would be surprised to know that journaling can help teach you essential life skills. Journaling is a great way to explore our thought processes. Reaching clarity in our thoughts and emotions makes it easy for us to decide. 

Our brain is prepared to make some decisions automatically based on previous experiences and intuition . However, it would be best to weigh your options to form an “informed” decision when a new situation arises.  

Before we discuss this further, let’s look at the common decision-making styles. Try to figure out which one you use in your daily life.

Decision-Making Styles

Most individuals employ one or more decision-making styles in unfamiliar situations. 

This means choosing the option that complies with the majority. Such as choosing something trendy, famous, or most validated in society. 

As the name suggests, it refers to making impulsive decisions. Such as selecting the first option presented without much thought or reflection.  

Delegation 

This decision-making style might reflect a lack of confidence . It is called delegation, and the person wants others to decide for them. 

This is not an active decision-making style. Instead, it is a passive approach of letting fate take over. The person is hesitant to make decisions and runs away from responsibility. 

Reflecting/ Balanced

A balanced process indicates the careful reflection of all the factors involved in a decision. The individuals form the conclusion by analyzing all the positive and negative aspects. This is the optimal approach for decision-making. 

If you make decisions based on the first four strategies, you must learn the balanced process instead. While other strategies work sometimes, they are not recommended for important decisions. Putting pen to paper will help you learn the balanced approach. 

Benefits of Journaling in Decision Making Process

Journaling can help the decision-making process in several ways: 

Follows a Structure

Through journaling, you follow each decision and think of the outcomes. This reduces ambiguity and gives you clarity about what you want in life. 

Confidence and Satisfaction

Writing down what you want will give you confidence in your decisions. You’ll rarely change your mind and can depend on your choices. 

Less Time Consumption

Difficult decisions can occupy your head until you are fed up. Journaling can make this process easy and less time-consuming.  

Improvement in Critical Thinking

Decision-making involves critical thinking. Keeping a journal will help you to analyze your past decisions and use these insights for the current situation. You can learn and improve your decision-making skills with every new journal entry! 

Overcoming Decision Stress

Journaling combats the stress, anxiety, and confusion associated with making big decisions in life. It eliminates uncertainty and makes you content with your choices.  

The above benefits are only possible with regular practice. So, it would be best if you followed a routine for decision journaling. You can start with journal prompts for decision-making (which we will discuss shortly). For now, let’s learn about decision journals.

What Are Decision Journals?

Decision-making is an inevitable part of our lives. A decision journal provides a strategic way to learn from our past decisions. 

“Decision journals record, track, and reflect on the thought process behind any decision.” 

They are meant to improve your decision quality by carefully monitoring past decisions. Learning from the past will help improve your future. Journal prompts for decision-making will help you in the following situations:

• You are indecisive and unsure about your choice.
• You forget how you made significant decisions. 
• You get nervous when you have to make an important decision.
• You don’t realize your decision-making patterns and go with the flow.
• You cannot analyze the decision and its consequences.
• You want to improve your decision-making skills but don’t know how to take actionable steps.
• You struggle to make good decisions on your own.
• You often seek validation for your decisions.

Making smarter decisions will have a significant impact on your quality of life. No one can predict the future, but we can put ourselves in the best position to benefit from any situation. Improving your decision-making skills is the best way to be content in life and not have any regrets about the past.

What is Decision Making Analysis

Now we will discuss the “method” by which you make decisions through journaling. The method discussed below is inspired by Benjamin Franklin and various self-help books on decision-making. We are presenting a simplified version that you can use in daily life.

Identify the Outcome

The first step is identifying the outcome of the decision-making process. What do you want to achieve at the end? 

For instance, “I want to decide if I should buy a car or not.” 

Make the Columns

Next, make two columns in your journal— one for pros and the other for cons. You can give it a title about what you want to decide. 

For example, “The pros and Cons of buying a car.”

Contemplate and Gather Information

Try to fill the columns by collecting as much information as possible. Put in all the relevant facts and emotions associated with the decision. You don’t have to complete the list in one sitting. Give yourself time to think and keep your journal handy if anything comes to mind. 

Take a look at the following example:

Pros and Cons of Buying a Car

Give Yourself a Deadline

It is good to set a deadline for your process. You can tell yourself you will brainstorm for 2-3 days and try to form a conclusion after that. This also helps save time while making time-sensitive decisions.

Weigh Out Your List

After you have completed your pros and cons list, start to weigh out your options. Here, you can write your thoughts, emotions, and priorities. Cancel the pros and cons that are equal in weight.  

Let’s continue the example above:

After making a list, ask yourself, “how do I feel” about every option? Weigh each option from different perspectives. Set your emotions aside and introduce them into the process at a later stage.

Form a Decision and Analyze it Later

Formulate your decision based on the above process. After you have applied your decision, you should wait for the consequences and log them in your journal. Check if your decision was wise and what it led towards.  

You can also analyze your patterns after practicing journaling for some time. Do you make impulsive decisions, or do you take your time? Are you risky or conservative? Do you change your choices with emotions or logic?

Ultimately, you will start realizing your strengths and weaknesses. You can leverage them for your future decisions and improve yourself. The goal is not to make a “correct” decision! It is to make an informed decision that you do not regret later.

Putting yourself in the best possible position is the way to improve your quality of life. We cannot control many factors, but we can understand patterns to improve our chances of success .

How To Start a Decision-Making Journal?

Although starting a journal is not tricky, you must try and become consistent. The benefits of the journal only appear when you do it as a routine activity. If you haven’t used a journal before, it is time to buy one and start practicing!

Tips For Starting Decision Journals

Here are some tips that will come in handy when you start your journaling journey for improving decision-making.

Simpler is Better

You need your journal to simplify decision-making, so don’t make it complicated. Write the main points in simple words. Keep it easy to refer back to and reflect on.

Use it Wisely

Keep your decision journal for the things that need your attention . Please don’t use it for every small decision. It will wear you out and cause decision fatigue. With practice, you will be able to apply the process mentally!

Make a Decision Template

After you have learned the process, craft a simple template to follow. It doesn’t have to be something fancy. Just some basic details that will save you time. 

Learn From It

Decision journaling is not only about making decisions but also learning from them. Review your journal and try to learn from your decisions. 

Watch the following YouTube video and start your journaling journey today!

20 Journal Prompts For Decision Making

We understand that starting from scratch can be challenging. Mental blocks are real and can waste a lot of precious time. Therefore, we suggest you take help from our journal prompts for decision-making. These will inspire you to keep writing. 

• What is the first thought that comes to mind about the decision?
• What are the pros and cons of each option I am considering?
• How do the choices make you feel?
• Do you feel motivated or drained after a particular choice?
• Does this choice bring you closer to your mission in life?
• Do you need any extra information to proceed with this choice? If so, what is it?
• Imagine your life in five years. Are you happy with your choice?
• Is there any part of this choice that makes you anxious?
• Does this choice reflect my values in life?
• Describe your decision-making process. Can you improve it?
• What have you learned from your past decisions? 
• What would I do if a friend was facing this decision?
• What is my gut telling me?
• How can I gather more information to make an informed decision?
• Who can I talk to for advice or perspective on this decision?
• How will this decision affect the people around me?
• How can I align this decision with my life purpose?
• What are my values and how do they relate this decision?
• What are my priorities in this decision?
• What are the most important factors in making this decision?

5 Book Recommendations to Improve Decision Making

We would go as far as to say that good decision-making is better than being productive all day! We cannot emphasize how important it is to learn the skill of making informed decisions. So, here are five books to help you learn this skill.

1- Decisive: How to Make Better Choices in Life and Work (2013)

2- Smart Choices: A Practical Guide to Making Better Decisions (2015)

3- Thinking, Fast and Slow (2013)

4- The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less (2016)

5- Thinking in Bets: Making Smarter Decisions When You Don’t Have All the Facts (2018)

Final Thoughts

If you are torn between the two choices, journaling is here for the rescue! Decision-making is a vital skill, and many fail to use it wisely. You can always learn to make informed decisions no matter the situation. 

Journaling can help you clarify your thought processes which, in turn, helps you make good decisions. If you haven’t flexed your writing muscles in a while, we suggest using journal prompts for decision-making. 

While journaling is not for routine decisions (such as what to eat), it will undoubtedly make you more confident when making difficult decisions! Let us know about your decision-making journey in the comments below.

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How to make a difficult decision

It’s tempting but unwise to delay important choices. grasp the nettle by using both systematic checklists and gut instinct.

by Joseph Bikart   + BIO

is an internationally renowned executive coach and communication advisor. He works with public figures and senior leaders through Templar Advisors, the firm he co-founded more than 20 years ago. He is the author of The Art of Decision Making: How We Move from Indecision to Smart Choices (2019). He lives in London, UK.

Edited by Christian Jarrett

Listen to this Guide.

Need to know

A couple of years ago, following the publication of my book The Art of Decision Making (2019), I took part in the BBC Radio 4 programme ‘Should I Stay or Should I Go?’ named after the 1981 hit song by the Clash. This is the question we face time and time again, whether it applies to a relationship, a job, the home we inhabit, or any other critical dilemma.

My work as an executive coach involves helping people make these tough decisions for themselves and ultimately by themselves. Unlike a mentor, this is not about giving advice. It is about giving people the tools and confidence to trust their own choices and to act upon them.

In this Guide, I will give you an overview of some of these tools and techniques, and how you can use them to accelerate and improve your decision-making.

Why decisions can be so difficult

Ultimately, what defines a hard decision isn’t so much the decision itself, but how it is perceived by the decision maker. You might feel that a decision is hard because:

• the stakes, for you, are particularly high;
• two or more options weigh the same in your mind; or
• this decision brings back unhelpful memories or fears. This is the case, for example, where a choice is reminiscent of disappointing past choices. It is also the case for the individual whose psychological complexes are triggered by certain challenging situations. For example, a decision might unconsciously reignite a past traumatic event and alter your judgment as a result.

Consider the person who struggles with the decision to accept a more senior position with a considerably higher compensation, when many others would jump on the opportunity. This might be linked to their fear of failing in a high-stakes/high-visibility position. It could also be because the option of staying in a less senior role is equally attractive, but for different reasons, such as having more free time. Finally, for this person, perhaps breaking into this level of seniority throws up a whole range of issues that originated in their childhood. I have seen this often with successful professionals whose important decisions are regularly affected by the power of an overactive superego (that is, the image of a parent or another past figure of authority, irrespective of whether they are still alive or not).

In other words, decisions are complex, not necessarily because the choice between two options is complex but also, and more importantly, because human beings are complex.

The etymology of the word ‘decision’ provides further insight. It comes from the Latin word caedere meaning ‘to cut off’. Decisions cut us off from other choices, other opportunities and the possibility of better outcomes. For this reason, the act of deciding can feel like a self-inflicted wound.

Avoiding a decision is in fact a decision

When faced with a difficult decision, it can be tempting to take the easy road and procrastinate. This attitude illustrates what might be the greatest myth about decision-making: that, faced with two choices, we still have the option to not decide and to do nothing. In fact, procrastination is not the refusal to decide, or to ‘freeze’ a decision in time, rather it is the active decision to remain undecided. It is only when you realise that procrastination is a decision that you will start finding this option less attractive. Moreover, indecision and procrastination do not postpone the pains of a decision to a future day: they multiply that pain by spreading it across every minute of every day, until you finally decide.

Research from the 1990s led by the US psychologist Thomas Gilovich provides further evidence for why it can be shortsighted to kick a difficult decision down the road. Gilovich and his team showed that although, in the short term, people experience more regret from ‘errors of commission’ (taking an action that leads to a disappointing outcome), in the long term it is actually ‘errors of omission’ that lead to more regret – that is, disappointing outcomes that arise from not taking an action.

Therefore, over the long term, it is often wiser to act, and therefore to decide. As Ralph Keeney, a decision scientist and professor emeritus at the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University in North Carolina, put it: ‘Your decisions offer you the only way to purposefully influence anything in your life. Everything else just happens.’

If you struggle with decision-making – generally or occasionally – this Guide will help you understand some of the reasons behind it, and point you in the direction of solutions.

I’d encourage you to read this section with one difficult decision in mind and use the exercises to help you work through it. Ideally, it will be one you are facing right now. If that’s not applicable to you, try revisiting a past decision instead.

Identify the parts of yourself that want different things

When facing difficult decisions, it is likely that different parts of you might want different things. For example, when deciding whether to book a pricey holiday, one part of you (prudent) might think that this expense is unreasonable, while another part of you (hedonistic) prefers to make the most of life and go for it, while yet another part of you (serious) will think that work should come first. Decision-making involves the deliberation between the different parts of yourself. Resolving this conundrum involves getting them to sit together around an imaginary table to agree on an outcome they can all settle for. In practical terms, try writing down what each part of you wants and seeing if you can identify a solution that optimises the joint aspirations of your different inner selves. Even if you don’t get that far just yet, the simple act of recognising your own competing desires will help you to think through the decision more effectively.

Create distance from the decision

The more you struggle with difficult decisions, the less distance from them you enjoy and the more bogged down you can become. And yet, psychological distance provides a sense of perspective that is a key component of effective decision-making. Already in the 16th century, the Spanish priest and theologian Ignatius of Loyola suggested three ways you can achieve more psychological distance from a difficult decision:

• by letting go of your preferred option momentarily, to consider all options objectively (later in the Guide I show a way to do this);
• by imagining that you are advising a friend making the same decision; and
• last but not least, by imagining reflecting from your deathbed on the same decision, years (hopefully many decades!) later.

Back to contemporary times, it is reassuring that even the world’s most famous investor, Warren Buffett, credits some of his best decision-making to a method known as the 10/10/10, meaning: how will I feel about today’s decision in 10 days’ time, vs 10 months, vs 10 years? Here again, it is about creating more distance between yourself and your decision, to benefit from greater perspective.

Think outside the box

‘She did not know then that imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire; you will what you imagine; and at last you create what you will.’

In this quote, George Bernard Shaw spells out poetically the process that leads to creation: it starts with imagination. This is relevant to decision-making because we often make the mistake of limiting our scope. If you are confronted with two or three options and you’re struggling to decide, what you might be missing is that there is at least one more creative option available to you.

How can you think outside the box and see that other elusive option? One way is to adopt a childlike mindset. ‘As children go through a school education, grow up and learn to function as productive adults, one thing they tend to lose is their creative confidence, this positive emotion that comes from looking at tasks without preconceived notions of what outcome is expected,’ says my friend Marie Taillard, professor of creativity marketing and associate dean at ESCP Business School in London. But all is not lost! She adds that: ‘Adults can in fact train themselves to recapture their creative confidence. When primed to adopt a childlike mindset, for instance by experiencing the excitement and open-endedness of building with Lego bricks, adults can trigger their confidence and then boost their creative skills over time.’

Supporting Taillard’s assertion, when psychologists at North Dakota State University primed a group of graduate students to imagine they were seven-year-olds before completing a series of creativity tests, they significantly outperformed a control group who weren’t given that same instruction.

Another way to think outside the box is to ask friends or contacts who are known for this ability if they can see another option available to you.

List out your objectives

Objectives are the ultimate goals that a decision aims to achieve. For example, if I decide to move home, why is it that I concern myself with this decision? It could be because I want more space, a safer neighbourhood, better access to transport, or to nature, proximity to friends and family, or a combination of these and many more. When making a difficult decision, it is important to list your objectives and cross-check how many of them would be satisfied by each decision. Research by Valentina Ferretti at the Department of Management in the London School of Economics has shown that our decisions frequently suffer from having too narrow a range of objectives (perhaps because we are not thinking outside-the-box enough). Overall, Ferretti’s advice is to increase the number of objectives by around 50 per cent. So take a look at your objectives and see if you can list some more.

Consider the case of Michelle, a theatre director I worked with, who was faced with the decision of how to boost attendance at her venue. Before her appointment, attendance at the theatre, located about an hour’s drive outside London, had been decreasing year on year. Under her leadership, the theatre had raised funds to improve the quality of its plays, however the results were disappointing. Despite all the hard work, this approach had almost no effect on attendance.

The Board believed that the theatre needed to go further in this direction and attract ‘big names’. Michelle was faced with the choice between pursuing the same strategy, as her Board encouraged her to do, or take a radically different course. This is where widening the objectives was critical. A survey of theatre goers and – importantly – of theatre non-goers, helped with this, showing that what potential audiences most objected to was: distance from their home (especially for late shows), lack of parking, short runs of shows, poor quality of food and beverage options, long queues at the box office, poor quality of the website and booking experience. The quality of the plays had never been an issue.

With a greater awareness of the objectives relevant to her decision-making, Michelle started scheduling earlier shows (to allow Londoners to catch the last train home); she negotiated with the local authorities to offer affordable parking to theatre goers; she invested more in fewer shows with longer runs; re-allocated front-end staff; and outsourced catering. With the little money left in the kitty, she invested in upgrading the theatre’s website – a significant portion of it being financed by online advertising.

By increasing her objectives from two to eight, Michelle was able to significantly improve her decision-making and the outcomes that ensued. Within two years, ticket sales increased by a third, despite a 15 per cent increase in ticket prices. This was a game-changer for the theatre, which is now able to promote cutting-edge work again, rather than merely relying on the ‘classics’ in its repertoire.

Use a weighting system to compare multiple options

By methodically assessing your options against a comprehensive set of objectives, it is possible that one option will emerge as the obvious decision to take. In many instances, though, more work will be needed.

The Darwin Archive at the Cambridge University Library holds a remarkable extract from Charles Darwin’s journal, in which he wrote, in 1838, a list of pros and cons about one of his most important decisions ever: whether to marry his cousin Emma Wedgwood. As one side (in favour) seemed to outweigh the other, he concluded at the bottom of the page: ‘Marry – Marry – Marry QED.’ After the birth of his and Emma’s 10th child together, Darwin could have been forgiven for thinking that his decision-making approach was proven and irreproachable. Thankfully, there are more sophisticated methods you can use to choose from multiple options.

Annie Duke, the author of How to Decide (2020), recommends considering each of your options separately, listing the potential outcomes were you to take that option, and making an estimation of the likelihood of each of those outcomes happening. I think this approach has particular merit if you are finding it hard to distance yourself from a preferred option, or to rid yourself from potentially irrational positive or negative biases.

With my clients, I often use the following approach that integrates considering your objectives with predicting likely outcomes:

• First, what are the objectives behind your decision?
• Next, what weight (from 0-100 per cent) would you assign to each objective: ie, how important is this objective to you?
• Now, turning to each option available to you, what mark (between 1 and 10) would you give it to fulfil the various objectives?
• I then ask my clients to add up and compare the options. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the option with the highest score is the one they must follow, but the exercise leads people to question what matters most to them.

To give you a sense of how this process can work, the tables below illustrate this method in the context of choosing one among three attractive job offers. In this case, although ‘salary’ has the highest weight, the first two options – despite offering higher salaries – are the least attractive once all the other objectives are duly considered.

Listen to your emotions

Admittedly, any systematic weighting exercise requires you to assign scores and probabilities in a way that isn’t entirely scientific and that relies on an element of ‘gut feeling’. However, this isn’t a weakness of these approaches, as tapping into the emotional part of your psyche is key to effective decision-making. In some cases, it is the most essential component.

As Sigmund Freud put it:

When making a decision of minor importance, I have always found it advantageous to consider all the pros and cons. In vital matters, however, such as the choice of a mate or a profession, the decision should come from the unconscious, from somewhere within ourselves. In the important decisions of personal life, we should be governed, I think, by the deep inner needs of our nature.

The more recent work of the neurologist Antonio Damasio also highlights the importance of emotions in decision-making. His research into what became known as the ‘somatic marker hypothesis’ showed that people’s gut feelings (their bodily based reactions to different options) often inform their decision-making in an advantageous way before they are consciously aware of the reasons for those feelings. When dealing with difficult decisions, then, learning to listen to your emotions and feelings is a powerful indicator of what you truly aspire to.

How can we access the ‘deep inner needs of our nature’? Freud’s ‘tricks’ to access the unconscious are well documented: from hypnosis (which he later abandoned) to dreams, free associations and, of course, the eponymous Freudian slips . But I do not recommend that your difficult decisions should be resolved by psychotherapy. Thankfully, there are alternative ways of ‘digging deep’.

A more practical approach is to write about each option (half a page each time on a separate sheet), and explore how you feel while writing; also, how you feel about each sheet in front of you. If you throw them into the wastepaper bin one by one until one remains, what are the emotions and feelings prompted when you dispose of them? Another shortcut into your emotions is to close your eyes when thinking about each option and try to identify the colour that you see (with your eyes still closed) when thinking about one or the other option. If, for example, one option evokes a dark-grey colour whereas another one brings about a more positive, bright-orange tint, this could be another sign of the unconscious knocking at the door…

I’m not suggesting that decisions are a matter of gut feeling only. However, there is value in checking your more rational modes of decision-making against your deeper intuition.

Use micro-decisions to overcome inertia

Having selected your best option, you need to act upon it. This is what trips up many people. They find it hard – sometimes even impossible – to get started. One way out of such a dilemma is to break down your big decision into a series of micro-decisions.

Here’s an example. Imagine Paul has been renting his apartment in New York for 15 years and has finally made the important decision to buy a home rather than keep renting. However, he seems unable to act upon this decision. The solution is for him to break down this major decision into a series of ‘micro-decisions’, such as:

• Decide on the sum he can invest. For this, the first step would be to call his bank or a financial advisor.
• Decide on a location to buy, and the minimum size property he would be happy with. It is also at this step that Paul should consider other objectives (eg, distance from work and friends, access to parks, etc).
• Decide which available properties are within his budget, and rank those he likes against his objectives.

This is only the beginning of the process, but getting started with this level of clarity can create a momentum that is more likely to lead to progress.

Another reason why we sometimes fail to act upon our decisions is because of a lack of conviction in the option(s) we have selected. When that’s the case, it is worth revisiting each of the previous steps in this Guide until you become more confident in your final decision.

Key points – How to make a difficult decision

• Understand why some decisions can be so hard . It’s not just the high stakes that can make decisions difficult: sometimes the reasons lie in your past.
• Avoiding a decision is in fact a decision . It can be tempting to kick a difficult decision down the road – but that itself is actually a decision, and probably the wrong one.
• Identify the parts of yourself that want different things . Be clear on which parts of you want what, and try to find a compromise between them.
• Create distance from the decision . Imagine advising a friend making the same decision or exploring how you would feel 10 days / 10 months / 10 years after making (or avoiding) a decision.
• Think outside the box . To unlock new ways of thinking about the same situation, adopt a child’s imaginative mindset or ask a particularly creative friend.
• List out your objectives . For this decision to be fully successful, what would it need to achieve? Including more objectives will lead to better decisions.
• Use a weighting system to compare multiple options . By methodically assessing your options against a comprehensive set of objectives, it is possible that one option will emerge as the obvious decision to take.
• Listen to your emotions . Learning to listen to your emotions and feelings is a powerful indicator of what you truly aspire to. Writing about the options can help.
• Use micro-decisions to overcome inertia . Having made a decision, it can be difficult to know how to begin to enact it. To get going, break down the big decision into a series of focused micro-decisions.

How to make difficult decisions under pressure

Some challenging decisions afford us the benefit of time. Choosing a new career, for example, shouldn’t be something you decide in haste. And in this type of situation, the steps listed above will help you gain confidence in your decisions and their likely outcomes.

At the other end of the spectrum, some decisions need to be made under pressure, sometimes within a few seconds. I’m thinking of the surgeon at the operating table, the nurse in the middle of the COVID-19 crisis, the air traffic controller having to divert a plane in order to avoid an imminent accident, or the firefighter having to decide whether to send her crew into a burning building to rescue one life, while endangering all the others.

Broadly speaking, making decisions under pressure can blur people’s judgment in at least three ways:

• Under stress, we tend to behave as if we are under time pressure even when we’re not. We often have more time than we think.
• Pressure leads people to adopt a narrow vision of the situation at hand. In highly stressful situations, we tend to focus all our attention on the decision and ignore peripheral information, which may be vital. This is known as ‘cognitive tunnelling’.
• Others will suffer from the opposite problem and experience ‘decision inertia’, an expression coined by the British forensic psychologist Laurence Alison, especially if confronted with what appear to be two or more bad options. According to Alison, ‘good decision-makers judge when further delay will end up costing more than any decision they take’.

High-pressured decision-making is the object of research by the British psychologist and Chief Fire Officer Sabrina Cohen-Hatton. She developed her approach to high-pressured decision-making in the context of incident command in the emergency services, but it can apply to many other areas, both in the corporate world and in our private lives. She recommends that individuals and teams ask themselves the following five questions:

• Why are we taking this decision?
• What do we think will happen if we do?
• Is the benefit of taking this decision proportional to the risk?
• Do we have a common understanding and position on the situation? In the case of a firefighting mission, this would mean ensuring that all the officers agree on their reading of the situation, and on the approach to follow.
• Is the collective decision in line with my professional judgment and experience?

Let’s see how this approach could apply in the corporate world, in a less dramatic situation in which you and your colleagues must decide how to act after your preferred, highly qualified candidate Lucy has received a pay offer from your main competitor that is 30 per cent above your offer (the clock is ticking because Lucy has told you that your rival has given her 24 hours to choose). The main decision in front of you is whether to match your rival’s offer or to let go of the chance of hiring Lucy.

You need to make sure that your decision will not be driven by a fear of missing out. You also need to ensure that you will not reject this promising candidate solely based on feelings of pride. Adapting Cohen-Hatton’s decision-making approach, in this situation, I would recommend you and your team ask yourselves these key questions:

• Establish whether your team is working towards the same objectives: in this case, what is the position you are trying to fill, and what are the qualifications you need?
• What do you think will happen if you do, or do not, match your competitor’s offer?
• If you did decide to match the other offer, what would be the implications for your company (both financially, and in terms of resource allocation and team management)? Also, if you failed to recruit Lucy, what would be the impact on your business?
• Do you all agree that matching the rival offer makes sense? Do you agree on your best compensation package?
• Does the decision you are leaning towards jar with your own professional/ethical judgment or are you fully supportive of it?

Working through these questions will help you to counter the biases that can affect decision-making in pressurised contexts.

As we reach the end of this Guide, it is worth remembering that difficulties with decision-making are not always the sign of a weakness that needs ‘fixing’. On the contrary, these difficulties may shed light on the fact that you are treading new ground, exploring the unknown and stretching yourself. In this case, a challenging decision should be viewed as an injunction to step up, a calling to grow into a higher version of who you are. And, in the process, you are likely to learn a great deal about yourself too.

Links & books

My book The Art of Decision Making (2019) explores the deeper roots of our indecision and provides a step-by-step guide to improving our ability to decide, as well as improving the quality of our decisions.

The video of my talk for Watkins Books in London covers some of the highlights from the book.

Also, my webinar ‘Decision Making Decoded’ (2021) explores the topic of decision-making as an equation, the components of which are explained using examples from our everyday lives.

The article ‘How to Tackle Your Toughest Decisions’ (2016) by Joseph Badaracco for the Harvard Business Review . Badaracco, professor of business ethics at Harvard Business School, has formulated five questions that can help us shed new light on our most challenging choices.

The article ‘How to Make the Right Decisions Under Pressure’ (2020) by the author Ian Leslie for the online magazine BBC Worklife provides interesting insights into some of the academic research into the impact of stress on our decision-making, and how to overcome it.

The book Looking for Spinoza : Joy, Sorrow, and the Feeling Brain (2003) by Antonio Damasio is enlightening as well as thought-provoking, as it creates a parallel between the works of the 17th-century Dutch philosopher and recent neurological discoveries.

The book The Heat of the Moment: A Firefighter’s Stories of Life and Death Decisions (2019) by Sabrina Cohen-Hatton, who is one of only six female fire chiefs in the UK, and a doctor of behavioural neuroscience.

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How to make a difficult decision & Bring your notes and audio together

In this week's version of Creativerly: Cheat codes for your memory, the normality of Anxiety Attacks, get it done for real, and a lot more.

You are reading Creativerly , the weekly digest about creativity and productivity-boosting tools and resources, combined with useful insights, articles, and findings from the fields of design and tech. The newsletter built for the creative community.

Hey and welcome to Creativerly 151 👋

The last purchase I made in 2021 was the eBook called Calmer Notes by Elizabeth Butler *. Calmer Notes is a method that will help you craft a tailored, mindful personal knowledge management system to organise your digital notes, files, tasks, and ultimately your life. If you have spent some time on Twitter over the course of 2021 I am pretty sure that the term „Personal Knowledge Management“ or short „PKM“ has made an appearance on your timeline. Tools like Roam, Logseq, Obsidian, got extremely popular over the last 12 months, as more and more people started to make more out of their digital notes.

I am exploring and watching this space for quite some time now. Although I am writing a lot about note-taking, productivity, and PKM tools, I struggled to find my personal companion that gives me the right features to build up my system. The reason for that is simple: I somehow have the „Shiny-new-app-syndrome“ which means whenever I find out about a new tool, I need to test it out. On one hand, that is part of my work at Creativerly since I am going to share those tools and write about them, but on the other hand, this led to the fact, that my notes are scattered across different apps.

Calmer Notes by Elizabeth Butler was the one guide I was looking for, to help me build not the perfect but my personal PKM system. One of the biggest takeaways of Calmer Notes is that before you start using a PKM tool make sure to sit down and write down the goal you want to achieve while building and maintaining a PKM system, and also make sure to have a clear image of the information that you would like to structure and organize. If you have a clear image of that, you can then proceed to search for your 80% solution/tool. That is the crucial part. There isn’t the perfect PKM tool that suits everyones’ workflow. But there are tools that almost work as you wish, with some little compromise.

I thought that I found my beloved PKM tool when I started to use Logseq, because I am such a huge fan of using the outliner approach for daily journaling. But then I found myself always switching to Obsidian whenever I was taking book or article notes, because for this process I simply love to have the possibility to actually craft pages and documents formatted by headlines, paragraphs, blocks, etc. In Obsidian I can easily use the outliner approach manually by simply typing a dash. But to use Obsidian on all of my devices (which is something I do not want to compromise on) I would need to invest in Obsidian sync. Recently, I bought a subscription for Craft, which I use for project management. As I spend more and more time with Craft while reading Calmer Notes by Elizabeth Butler, I realised that Craft is my 80% (maybe more like 90%) solution. I have daily notes (same as with Obsidian I can manually create the outliner approach), I have markdown support, backlinks, integrations, tasks, cross-platform availability, it is fast and beautiful, and whenever I want to leave Craft for another tool, I can export all my notes as markdown files.

Do not get blinded by any new note-taking tool entering the market. Do not get blinded by other people’s full-fledged PKM systems. If you want to get the perfect guide on your road to your PKM system, make sure to check out Calmer Notes by Elizabeth Butler *. It helped me a lot, and I think you can profit from it too.

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Apps, Software, Tools

When we always talk about note-taking, there is clearly one dedicated space that has not been on my radar yet: combining note-taking with audio. I have never explored audio recording for quick „note-taking“. As I recently stumbled across Noted, that might change in the future. Noted is a fully integrated audio recording and note-taking app. At the core, Noted is a solid note-taking app, that gives you the possibility to set up different notebooks for all your projects. To find dedicated notes faster, you can structure and organize all your notes by using tags. But besides that, Noted is the perfect companion if you are a fan of taking notes while being in a meeting, listening to a talk or presentation, or watching a video or tutorial.

If you have ever been in a situation in which you tried to take notes while being in a meeting and listening to multiple people talk, you probably know that it is extremely hard to capture everything that is important to you. Noted solves that problem. Noted records your audio during someone is talking. Whenever you type something, your notes are time-stamped to your recording. That is an incredibly powerful feature to get the most out of your meeting notes. If you ever feel you missed some important bits to note while you were listening, you can always check the recording in Noted. Additionally, Noted lets you format, highlight, share, and export all your notes.

Noted is available exclusively for the Apple ecosystem. Every single platform has some unique advantages. For example, Noted for iPad supports the Apple Pencil, which means you can accelerate your creativity by simply starting scribbling. Noted for Apple Watch lets you record audio straight from your wrist no matter where you are. On macOS, Noted delivers a beautiful interface to get the big image of all your notes. Since Noted is designed for the Apple ecosystem, all your notes sync seamlessly via iCloud between all your devices. All of those features are available for free. If you want to take your digital note-taking to another level, Noted+ gives you additional powerful features just like Dictation, which lets you dictate your ideas and Noted will transform your voice into text, Themes to customize your Noted experience or Intelligent Playback where machine learning detects background noises in your recording and skips them so you can jump directly to the most important bits.

But Noted+ has even more to offer. To get an idea of all the features included in Noted+ head over to their website. Noted is an incredibly powerful tool, and I am a huge fan of connecting audio with digital note-taking. As mentioned, you can use Noted completely for free. If you want some additional features for power-usage, Noted+ is available for €3,49 per month or €25,49 per year.

If you are working a lot in the browser, with countless tabs open, researching different topics, and getting lost in content, you might take a look at Heyday. There are quite a lot of productivity tools that struggle to effectively help us to actually get stuff done. Many productivity tools ask way too much from us which means users miss out on their benefits. Heyday is for that kind of people. Heyday helps you remember things. It is the helping hand, that eliminates the busywork of maintaining a productivity app. If you have 50 tabs open at all times, dozens of unopened emails, and if you are afraid of forgetting something interesting you saw today that might be useful a week, a month, or a year from now, Heyday is here to help.

Heyday automatically saves content you view and resurfaces it when you need it. Its browser extension automatically saves articles, tweets, websites, and more to help you remember everything and anything you see while you are browsing the internet. When you are doing a lot of research or reading on the web, you often find yourself with countless open tabs full of content. It becomes harder and harder to structure and organise the content, or even find the important bits you wanted to save. Heyday is for people who do lots of research, keep dozens of tabs open, and have no patience for busy work.

Every tab you have opened during browsing the web is saved within Heyday. So you can always swan dive into your memory, by searching Heyday to grab any nuggets from your past research session. It not only works with tabs, it also works with words locked away in documents, emails, and messages. Whenever you perform a search in Google, Heyday checks to see if you’ve researched the topic before. If you have, Heyday’s search companion resurfaces the stuff you’ve already seen. Heyday does not only feature a search companion, there is also a content companion that surfaces when you visit an article or document. The content companion will then show you summaries, related articles, and surrounding slack messages.

To stay on top of the content you consume, you can set a daily brief within Heyday, an email that shows you all the topics and tabs you saw the day before. Heyday is currently in Beta. You can sign up for early access now to get a free trial to try out the tool. After the trial, Heyday will cost you $10 per month or $100 per year. It is available as a browser extension, a Mac and Windows app, and on mobile iOS too (as far as I know an Android app is also in the works).

GoodTask is a beautiful and powerful task manager, that deeply integrates with Apple’s Reminders and Calendars. If you are working a lot with Reminders and Calendars, GoodTask can help you to reach a new level of productivity. Since GoodTask integrates with Apple’s Reminders, it was built and designed for the Apple ecosystem. No matter if you want to set up a simple checklist for grocery shopping or if you want to manage your next big project GoodTask nails the experience for both use-cases.

You can use GoodTask to keep track of just your Reminders and Calendars in one beautiful place, but you can also turn it into a full-fledged task manager with rich and powerful settings to match your workflow. GoodTask consists of three parts. The first one is „Lists“, and you probably guessed right, this is where all your lists are shown. „Tasks“ will show you the available and open tasks within a selected list, and finally „Task Detail“ will show you all the details regarding a specific task. I ama huge fan of how seamlessly GoodTask integrates with Reminders and Calendar, giving you a clear overview of what is scheduled next within one beautiful interface.

GoodTask’s Smart Lists gives you the option to filter your work and see tasks including a specific tag or even excluding others, you can see lists and calendars combined, only display overdue tasks, or see the ones you have recently added. If you would like to quickly capture a task, you can set up Quick Actions in GoodTask, to add the task you want in a blink. Additionally, GoodTask also lets you create text snippets to easily set up your task as you type in. I am really impressed with GoodTask’s beautiful interface. Also, intuitive views just like the board view make it incredibly easy to focus only on the tasks which are scheduled for a specific day. If you want to get the bigger image, you can always set your view to weekly, or monthly. Creating and setting up new tasks works like a breeze. Subtasks also give you the possibility to go into detail and manage even complex projects all within GoodTask.

GoodTask is available for iOS, iPad, macOS, and Apple Watch. There is a 14-day free trial, after that unlocking the iOS App will cost you €9,99 one-time fee, but to support the development of GoodTask you can also pay a subscription for €9,99 per year. The macOS app will cost you $39,99.

Svbtle is a minimal and lightweight publishing platform, that has been designed from the ground up to work the same way your brain does. No matter if you need to organise, develop, or want to share your thoughts, stories, and ideas with the world, Svbtle delivers the perfect platform for that.

Within Svbtle’s dashboard you keep track of unpublished ideas, or draft work-in-progress on the left side, and a list of published articles on the right. Svbtle has been designed to help you curate thoughts and stories. It creates a perfect environment to work on them slowly, and publish them whenever they are ready. While working within Svbtle, the dashboard encourages you to dump ideas, links, and thoughts into a flow of draft posts. Whenever you feel it is time, you slowly sculpt those ideas into published articles.

The actual writing experience and interface of Svbtle is focused on your writing. It is distraction-free and packed only with the most essential features. All articles written with Svbtle are written with Markdown. Svbtle’s editor also helps you to focus on your writing. To create beautiful-looking posts Svbtle supports hosted images, embedded videos, Tweets, and more. The editor also supports extended Markdown features like footnotes and code blocks.

Svbtle makes sure that all your published posts look great and beautiful on their platform. Svbtle features a thoughtfully designed writing experience. They spend a lot to time making sure the reading experience on Svbtle is great regardless of device or screen type.

Svbtle is offering a 7-day free trial. After that, creating, hosting, and publishing with Svbtle costs $7 per month.

Useful Resource

designgradients →

Designgradients is a lovely resource of 48 linear gradients, curated by designers, and to use as content backgrounds in any piece of digital art, web or interface design. While working on a new project, choosing the right colour assets will become a crucial task to tackle. It sometimes can be very time-consuming to manually go through different colour options you find aesthetically pleasing. Designgradients is a creativity-boost and time-saver by simply browsing a beautiful selection of 48 ready-to-use linear gradients. They are also a great starting point to experiment with them even more, by adding more colours and slightly changing the colour values. Get creative, but use designgradients as a starting point.

Mental Wealth

➢ How to make a difficult decision – “A couple of years ago, following the publication of my book The Art of Decision Making (2019), I took part in the BBC Radio 4 programme ‘Should I Stay or Should I Go?’ named after the 1981 hit song by the Clash. This is the question we face time and time again, whether it applies to a relationship, a job, the home we inhabit, or any other critical dilemma. My work as an executive coach involves helping people make these tough decisions for themselves and ultimately by themselves. Unlike a mentor, this is not about giving advice. It is about giving people the tools and confidence to trust their own choices and to act upon them. In this Guide, I will give you an overview of some of these tools and techniques, and how you can use them to accelerate and improve your decision-making.“

➢ The Normality of Anxiety Attacks – “You’re on a plane on the tarmac and it’s time to shut the doors. Suddenly, the insanity strikes you. You’ll be in a highly explosive sealed aluminium tube, breathing recycled kerosene-infused air, for the next six-and-a-half hours, with no way of getting off or out. The pilot may be exhausted or inwardly distressed. Air traffic control at any of the 40 waymarks along the journey may get momentarily distracted. You’ll be streaming 5 miles above the surface of the planet. No one else seems remotely sensitive to what any of this implies – they’re chatting and reading magazines – but for you, it’s the beginning of a kind of hell. You are on the verge of giving way to what we currently know as a panic attack.”

➢ How Long Should a Founder Remain CEO? – “Jack Dorsey’s sudden resignation from Twitter last month created a major stir, in Silicon Valley and around the world. Especially after his long-fought victory over an activist investor’s attempt to oust him back in 2020, Dorsey’s decision to hand the reigns over to CTO Parag Agrawal came as a shock to many. The move also bucked the recent trend of “founder-friendly” venture capitalists encouraging founder-CEOs to stick around for as long as possible. Dorsey’s resignation demonstrates how — and why — a founder might voluntarily step aside once their organization has reached a certain level of maturity, and invites the question: Should others follow his lead?”

➢ Privacy Versus Security is a False Choice – “The pandemic has shown how central global social media, messaging and collaboration platforms have become in people’s everyday lives. However, we don’t yet understand the trade-off between the security and privacy afforded by those platforms and the real costs of using them. We’re used to being told that privacy is a commodity, for example, but no one is really sure what is being sold, or what the real price is.”

Classifieds

• Intuitive, powerful and GDPR-compliant web analytics? YES! Wide Angle Analytics is all that in a single package. Give it a try today! Own your traffic.
• Learn to create, write, and scale successful blogs and newsletters to millions of readers. With Doing Content Right by Steph Smith.
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If you are interested in putting your tool, product, or resource in front of over 1300 creative minds, consider advertising in Creativerly and book a sponsor or classified ad spot. Find all the important information at creativerly.com/advertise .

Do you want to keep track of the traffic happening on your website? Then you are probably on the look for an analytics service. I encourage you to not use Google Analytics. I know it is free. But on the other hand, it is clunky, overwhelming, and most importantly it does not respect their users’ privacy. Get a privacy-friendly Google Analytics alternative instead. In case you do not know where to start, check out my blog post about privacy-friendly Google Analytics alternatives , that features over 20 analytics services.

➢ Quick Bits

• CES 2022: Everything you need to see
• Clubhouse finally works on the web – but now it’s too late
• Elizabeth Holmes found guilty on 4 of 11 charges
• Google loses Sonos smart speakers patent fight
• The 'New York Times' is buying sports site, 'The Athletic' for $550 million
• Tim Cook’s $100M payout, private jet costs, and more revealed in Apple SEC filing
• France fines Google and Facebook over cookies
• Apple becomes first $3 trillion company after boost from pandemic demand
• Victims of $200 million hack of BitMart crypto exchange still waiting to get their money back
• Welcome to the New WIRED

Twitter thoughts

The 5 stages of discovering new productivity apps 1. Frustration 2. Hope 3. Epic Discovery 4. Doubt 5. Frustration again Do you agree? what's your experience like when you discover new productivity apps? — Santi Younger (@SantiYounger) January 7, 2022

Till next time! 👋 ‌‌‌‌

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Essay on Hardest Decision In Life

Students are often asked to write an essay on Hardest Decision In Life in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on Hardest Decision In Life

Introduction.

Life is full of decisions. Some are easy, like choosing what to eat for breakfast. Others are hard, like deciding on a career path. The hardest decisions are often those that can change our lives forever.

What Makes a Decision Hard?

A decision becomes hard when it involves big changes, like moving to a new city, changing schools, or choosing a career. These decisions can be scary because they mean leaving behind what is familiar and stepping into the unknown.

The Role of Fear

Fear plays a big part in making a decision hard. We fear making the wrong choice and regretting it later. We fear the consequences of our decisions and how they will affect our lives.

Overcoming Fear

To overcome fear, we need to gather as much information as possible about the decision. We can talk to people who have faced similar decisions, research online, or seek professional advice.

250 Words Essay on Hardest Decision In Life

Understanding tough choices.

Life is like a journey filled with lots of turns, twists, and crossroads. At these crossroads, we often have to make decisions. Some are easy, while others can be really hard. The hardest decisions are the ones that can change our lives forever.

The Nature of Hard Decisions

Hard decisions often involve a lot of uncertainty. It’s like standing at a fork in the road, not knowing which path to take. We might have to choose between two things we love, or maybe decide to leave something behind. These decisions can make us feel scared, confused, and even lonely.

Examples of Hard Decisions

Let’s look at some examples. Choosing the right career can be a tough decision. We might love music, but also have a passion for science. Which path should we follow? Another hard decision could be about moving to a new place. We might be excited about the new opportunities, but also sad to leave our friends and family.

Dealing with Hard Decisions

So, how do we deal with hard decisions? First, it’s important to take time to think. We should weigh the pros and cons, and consider the consequences of each choice. Talking to someone we trust can also help. They can give us advice, or just listen when we need to share our feelings.

Learning from Decisions

Even though hard decisions can be scary, they also help us grow. Each choice we make teaches us something new about ourselves and the world around us. So, even if we make a mistake, it’s not the end of the world. We can always learn from it and move forward.

500 Words Essay on Hardest Decision In Life

What is a hard decision.

A hard decision is a choice that is tough to make. It often involves a situation where you have to pick one option out of many, and each option has its own set of benefits and drawbacks. These decisions can be about anything, from choosing which school to attend, to deciding whether to take a job offer or not. They are hard because they can change your life in big ways.

One of the hardest decisions you might face in life is choosing your career path. This is a big decision because it can shape your future. You might love to paint, but you also know that it can be hard to make a living as an artist. So, do you follow your passion or choose a more secure job?

Another hard decision could be about ending a friendship or relationship. If someone is hurting you or making you feel bad about yourself, you might need to decide to let them go. This can be very hard, especially if you care about this person a lot.

How to Make Hard Decisions

Making hard decisions can feel scary, but there are ways to make it easier. First, it can be helpful to gather as much information as you can. This can help you understand the possible outcomes of each choice.

Second, you can try to think about what is most important to you. What are your values? What are your goals? These can guide you in making your decision.

Finally, it can be helpful to talk to someone you trust about your decision. They can give you advice, or just listen, which can make you feel better.

The Impact of Hard Decicisions

Hard decisions can have a big impact on your life. They can lead to new opportunities, or close off old ones. They can change your relationships, your career, or your whole way of living.

But hard decisions can also help you grow. They can teach you about yourself, about what you value, and about how to deal with tough situations. They can make you stronger, wiser, and more resilient.

In the end, everyone has to make hard decisions in life. They can be scary and stressful, but they are also a part of growing up. By gathering information, thinking about your values, and talking to people you trust, you can make these decisions with confidence. And no matter what happens, remember that every decision is a chance to learn and grow.

If you’re looking for more, here are essays on other interesting topics:

Apart from these, you can look at all the essays by clicking here .

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Difficult Decisions

I'm at a point in my life where I need to make some big decisions. Being naturally indecisive, this causes me a problem. Then throw in immense anxiety of the unknown, and fear of failure and it's no wonder I'm sitting on my hands. But, I have at least acknowledged that I have to make a change, it's no longer about choosing to do something; I have to do something. If I don't, I'll grow old and die in this cold, damp, mouldy flat, and I don't want that life anymore. But in acknowledgement of the need to change, part of me still doesn't want to because it requires effort, and I'm naturally a lazy individual. The changes I want to make are: - Move into a nice warm home - Get more money coming in through some kind of work - Go swimming because I miss it (and for an unathletic person like me, that is huge) - Change career either through volunteering or study, - Meet up with my friends to remind myself that I'm not alone, - Start treating myself with events and days out - Attempting to improve my diet, by actually preparing and cooking real food In terms of changes that I have made recently, I started doing yoga and I actually enjoy it! So I know I can make positive changes for my own benefit. Now to tackle something else.

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Tiddlywinks! Google it, you'll love it, i swear! (Okay, im kidding! But if you dont know what it is, at least looking it up will give you a laugh.) Glad to hear you're identifying and making positive changes, FP, and found something fun at the same time!

Good luck and you can do it! The first step (of getting out of the same old) is the toughest. Once you get past it I believe you are gonna find that there's nothing to it. Another challenge is keeping up with the things that need consistency, for example cooking every day. Cooking every day might sound silly but I found it's one of the toughest self preserving routines. This and exercising, but my exercises are boring. Never tried yoga. All my friends that have ever picked up yoga though are psyched with it. I want to give it a try too, hoping it won't break me. Some serious stretching routines and I couldn't be more stiff. Go, go, go FP!

@Malisky I would definitely say to give yoga a try. You can download a free app called yoga workout, and you'll have lots of workouts to choose from to keep it interesting. You can have a choice of background music to help you focus too. But don't be put off if you're not as flexible as you'd hoped. Just do your best without overdoing it.

Changes take time. No one can change his entire life overnight. By starting with the easiest and smallest one changes could take less time rather than starting with the biggest and hardest one, just because its the most important one. Another an important aspect when it comes to making changes to one’s life, is patience. Don’t push yourself harder. Don’t rush it. Don’t expect results to come out just right away. Just be patient. Take it slowly. Take it strp-by-step and results will comes out soon or later no matter what chaneges you are making into your life.

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