The Paradox of Choice: beneficial or detrimental?

         One of my facebook friends recently posted an inspiring article on her wall called Why Some People Change Their Lives But Others Stay Stuck. The premise of the article is that some people stay stuck in lives they're unhappy with while others make wholesale changes to try and find a more desirable trajectory. The article also had a lot of parallels to the book the Paradox of Choice: Why More if Less, which I recently read.

        To summarize what I learned from these two sources, the upside of having so many choices is that we live in a time and place chalk full of opportunities to build the foundation of the life that can be closely in line with our dreams. You can basically live anywhere you want, trudge down whatever career path appeals to you, choose who to date and/or marry even from afar (or stay single), and live a life according to your priorities. The world is literally our campus to enjoy and the ideas and expertise of the world carried around in our pockets.

         Sounds amazing, right? With all this power and influence to impact our destinies at our fingertips, why is depression at an all-time high and why are people unhappy? It should be the opposite based on the freedoms and choices we have today.
        The answer to the above question is complicated. First, our expectations have been raised to unreasonable levels. Second, we are all human. Many people simply botch their major life choices. The botched choices could either be a result of picking a poor alternative that wasn't well thought out or not knowing what they want. Finally, analyzing a myriad of options can be an overwhelming process to reach a decision.        

         In particular, many twenty somethings end up at a crossroads suffering from a quarter-life crisis not knowing what to do to transition from adolescence to adulthood. A common scenario is they graduate college with an unmarketable degree and then move back in with their parents not knowing what to do next or work at an entry level job until another opportunity presents itself. This indecisive approach leads nowhere slowly and essentially squanders a lot of potentially robust skill development and resume building years.

        Of course, the alternative to doing nothing is to just pick a path with an imperfect filtering down process. However, it's hard to reap the benefits of hard work, dedication, and perseverance if your heart was never into the path in the first place. What compounds the issue is that with so many options on the table, there is no way to really compare and contrast all of them without an exhaustive effort. Although we live in an information age where there is almost an unlimited amount of information about nearly any specific path, we need to have a methodology for narrowing down what interests you. Is it money, prestige, quality of life, subject matter or some other factor that motivates you? Honing in on what you want out of your career can narrow things down in a hurry.

       Unfortunately, there will always be doubt about whether the choice you made was indeed the best one for you. You only have one life to live, so you can only start down the path you choose and hope for the best. At some point, if you find yourself burned out or unhappy you can always make adjustments and take some bigger risks to find a new trajectory.

        Even education and experience not directly related to your prime career earning years will eventually help in other aspects of life and can be built on for future career opportunities. In other words, you don't have to find a perfect fit necessarily in your 20s and 30s. The puzzle pieces will come together in due course as long as you are building new skills and exerting effort into learning new things. God truly doesn't care what profession we choose for ourselves in most cases, so there's no reason to place a heavy burden in trying to find a perfect job.

        Psychologically speaking, knowing that there are other options we left on the table we'll never know what "could have" been. We might kick ourselves for choosing a less appealing alternative or we may abort a perfectly good option midway in our career in the hopes that the grass is greener elsewhere. The dirty little secret about choices is that there is a never a perfect option. There are always flaws and tradeoffs no matter what career or path we choose.  

         Some people see taking ownership of their life trajectories as a burden, but I see it as a huge opportunity! It is up to you and nobody else how your life evolves, which can be a huge boon if you are methodical and ambitious about your decision making. Even though we can't blame anyone else for our failures, the career path we entered, the location or house we live in, or even the person we choose as a significant other (or the choice to be alone), I'd rather have that than be conscripted into subpar circumstances. All of the important stuff we have the power to choose from a vast array of options, which should be a good thing if you value freedom.

        There are some decisions we make that having too many choices can hinder our happiness sticking with what we have already decided on. In marriage, we should be committed to our spouse and realize that some choices are permanent except in extenuating circumstances (abuse, infidelity, etc.). Even if more appealing options come along, we need to understand the value of being with the same person and the inherent value of sharing a long personal history together. I've never been married, but it's always bothered me that some people look around at other options besides their spouse because they can in a discrete way. 

        Choices don't have to be major life decisions. It could be which priorities we focus on and the sum total of all of our daily decisions. By way of example, we can spend some of our free time watching tv or wander into the gym for a workout. We'll eventually reap the benefits or detriments of the habits that we choose to emphasize.

        If you are unhappy with your choices, then find a catalyst for change like the woman in the article I mentioned in the first paragraph. We don't need a traumatic event like hers to make major changes in our lives. We just need to wake up feeling resolved that making a u-turn or tweaking our circumstances will lead to happier days ahead. We have more control than we think and we often underestimate our abilities, but we'll never know unless we pick a path and be fully invested by sprinting down it.      

Pushing past your comfort zone

         One of the principles that I've been thinking about a lot lately is the "law of adaptation" as it relates to my comfort zone. What it basically means is that as I push myself further than I ever have before, I will either physically or psychologically adapt to the new limit. The new limit then becomes part of my comfort zone, since I'll feel at ease and without stress having done it before.

         Why is this principle important? There are great psychological benefits to be reaped from going further than you thought possible. For the rest of your life, you will know that being stretched that far is within your range and capacity.

         One of my favorite tv shows is the Biggest Loser. It's inspiring to watch people who don't know what they're capable of push past their psychological and perceived physical limitations to make changes in their lives. They don't just get out of their comfort zones, they basically wrestle it to the ground and make it yell uncle. Even the ones that don't win learn an important principle that we don't have to accept ourselves as-is if we are willing to pay the price of change.

        Our "normal" is often dictated by how challenging of circumstances we have had in the past. If you've lived in a tent before, you probably don't mind living in a 700 square foot apartment. On the other hand, if you've lived in a mansion your whole life you may be miserable in an apartment. As we throw ourselves into new circumstances that stretch our limits, our comfort zones become larger and larger. Our "normal" will then encompass so much that we'll feel at ease even if we are in circumstances that most people would feel stressed out in.

        Many of my friends and some of my family members have several children. In fact, my oldest sister has five! Even though I have 7 siblings, I imagine that my comfort zone around children is much different than hers. That's her normal. She has been pushed far greater than I have in this arena and her psychological state reflects being at ease even with the chaos created by children around her. Hopefully, she doesn't view the challenge of having kids the same as Jim Gaffigan in this video:

          One of the benefits of going to college for 9 years was that it exposed me to quite a bit of subject matter that I never would have studied otherwise. It was always surprising to me what subjects interested me and what subjects were deemed way too dry to stimulate my mind. I never would have thought that U.S. tax law would be an interesting subject!

        Most of my friends know that real estate is my biggest area of interest. However, I hadn't owned any real estate up until 2011 when I bought my first house. Even today with all my real estate related education, I still haven't filed taxes on an investment property or have tried being a landlord. To accomplish my goals, I need to experience those things and maybe even make some mistakes along the way.  As I do that for a year or two, I'll learn if my theoretical direction merits heavier investment or scaling back and liquidating.

         To this end, if you want to succeed in the business realm you have to dip your feet into the water to gain experience before jumping into the deep end. By jumping in head first without knowing the details cold, you might set yourself back financially with higher risk business ventures. For me, having this build up and expansion of my comfort zone makes my risks much more calculated than the alternative of taking blind risks that may lead to disastrous consequences. 

       The law of adaptation has really been a helpful principle to understand on my journey. It has helped me improve on many of my weaknesses and to move forward with goals that weren't necessarily supposed to be up my alley. Adaptation means that an element of self-creation can open up a whole realm of possibilities that I never thought possible.