This article about the dangers of holding on to too many options was linked by artist PJ Holden, I found it scarily familiar and interesting enough to want to preserve it for my own posterity.
On a minor level I do this with reading. Even though my reading time over the last six months has reduced dramatically (hence no reviews for a while, even when I am reading I struggle to find the time to blog about it) I still manage to waste time mulling over to buy a couple of new books as well as going through my bookshelves piling up a stack of 'possible reads' which all then lay unread as I struggle with which actually gets read first, if at all.
One nice thing was the point made about marriage which perfectly sums up why I decided to marry despite my not being particularly religious.
4 comments:
Nice article and very interesting. As the good doctor said we're all guilty of keeping options open, even when they hurt us. I just spent the last year being incredibly miserable in a job I used to love, hoping my boss's incompetence would be recognised and she would leave. But it was an option where, if she left, i had a chance at promotion and continuing to work with people I liked. I convinced myself it was a win/win situation when anybody else looking at it could see I was deluding myself.
Just read the first unread book you pick up from your bookshelf and then, like me, you can use the time saved to dither over something more important instead.
there is a lot of good research on this phenomena i have just finished Dan gilbert's book stumbling on happiness and here is a great presentation about how having choice makes us unhappy.
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/97
Ta for the link James, interesting stuff.
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