How to Become a Confident Decision-Maker

Why You Should Stop Asking for Feedback and Develop Self-Reliance

How often do you find yourself second-guessing your decisions? Maybe you procrastinate on your decisions until the last minute, thinking that it’ll be easier to decide as it gets closer. Or you’re always asking for other people’s opinions: ‘Does this outfit look good?’, ‘Should I go on this trip?’, ‘How should I handle this situation at work?’ While asking for input is normal and healthy at times, it should not be the defining characteristic of your choices. If you notice that you fall back on this kind of behavior, it’s likely a sign that you don’t trust your own choices. This lack of self-trust undermines your ability to make important decisions as well. Instead of trusting your competence and intuition, you find yourself paralyzed by a constant need for approval regarding your choices.

While it’s easier to rely on others to provide a sense of security in our choices, there are real consequences to not learning to become a confident decision-maker. It prevents you from moving in a clear direction in life.

The good news is that it’s possible to develop self-reliance which will enable you to live a more intentional life. It takes effort, but it’s well worth the work. When you develop the ability to become a confident decision-maker, you will also cultivate a deeper sense of peace around your choices. Conquering self-doubt is the cornerstone to making meaningful change and becoming an effective person.

Why Do We Outsource Our Decisions? 

Outsourcing our decision-making in our daily lives is convenient. When we’re always asking for feedback, it lets us shift the responsibility of making decisions onto others. Instead of informing ourselves, we can just ask our friends or family what they think. This makes us feel like we’re less likely to make a mistake. It feels safe because we feel validated when others approve of our choices. We also feel less responsible for the outcomes of those decisions. Because even if it doesn’t turn out how we thought it would, at least we knowthat they also thought it was a good idea. 

But this constant need for feedback makes us highly dependent on others’ opinions. It also becomes draining to the people around us. So how do we become less dependent on others and more secure in our choices?

Develop a sense of self-reliance.

Self-reliance is essentially taking ownership to define what’s important to you and developing the capacity to pursue it. This doesn’t mean that you never ask for advice or help. Nor does it mean that you seclude yourself from community and become completely independent. It simply means that you have trust in yourself to make good choices, and you’re willing to take responsibility for them.

If you develop a healthy sense of self-reliance, you create the freedom to live your life with intention. You will feel more at peace with your choices, even when you don’t know how things will turn out or have others’ approval. You’ll become more capable of acting with courage because you trust yourself to see your choices through. Self-reliance is an essential component of living a full life.

Developing Self-Reliance: Become a Confident Decision-Maker

Knowing the benefits of self-reliance, how do we go about developing it? The simplest way is to get better at making decisions. Like any other skill, decision-making requires practice to get better. So, if you want to become a more confident decision-maker, here are some practical tips that you can implement daily. These practices can help you make better decisions more frequently and overcome fear of regret.

Start Small: Own the Daily Decisions

Challenge yourself to stop asking for input on any daily decision for some time. This may seem innocuous, but you may not even be aware of how often you’re asking others to weigh in on decisions. When no one is telling you what you should do, then you have to inform yourself. You’ll have to do your own research, cultivate your own opinions, and define your own preferences.

Practice with small decisions. For example, maybe you always ask people what they think about your outfit. Or perhaps you always consult your friends and family for opinions on whether you should go on a trip. Start making these decisions without anyone’s input. You may be surprised at how uncomfortable it can be.

No one is validating your choices or talking through what makes the most sense. You have to do that for yourself. You may discover gaps in knowledge – like what style choices and colors suit you best. You may discover that you have difficulty deciding your priorities – is a weekend in the mountains worth taking PTO at work? Or would you rather use your vacation for something else?

Start practicing this with daily decisions that feel less risky and build up to bigger ones over time. Your sense of self-reliance will deepen over time as you become more informed and thoughtful about your choices. You’ll start to realize that you don’t need others’ approval to make good decisions.  

Give Yourself Permission to Make Mistakes

One of the main reasons why we fail to become a confident decision-maker is because we’re afraid of making mistakes. This is a natural fear, but part of coming into your own is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Consider it a rite of passage. You will make mistakes in life regardless. But at least this way, it’s your mistake. Not someone else’s.

One unexpected benefit of developing self-reliance in my own life was how much more competent I became in various areas of my life. I’ve developed a broader and more refined skillset than when I relied on others to give me direction all the time. I’ve learned that if something was important enough to me to ask for input, then it was important enough to learn about myself.

So start small and give yourself permission to ‘fail’. Not only will it motivate you to learn, but you’ll gather more knowledge and develop better instincts over time. This will be invaluable when bigger decisions come your way.

Make Peace with Your Choices

Another frequent issue is that we’ll make decisions and then afterward wish we’d done something else. It’s not so much that we’ve made a mistake, but rather that the outcome is different than what we’ve hoped for. But constantly re-evaluating our choices and wishing things were different will only lead to feelings of regret. Not only does it erode your trust in your own capabilities, but it prevents you from being present in your current circumstance.

If the unfavorable outcome could have been avoided, take a moment to learn from it. Then stop thinking about it and move on. Don’t pay an even higher cost for your decision by creating unnecessary stress. Whatever circumstance you now find yourself in, learn to stop worrying and be present in your current situation so that you can make the best of it. Often, it’s not the situation that’s the problem, but our attitude towards it.

Practical Exercise: Eliminate the Words ‘Should Have’

A small but effective way that I’ve learned to practice focusing on actions, rather than outcomes, is to stop saying “should have”.

My husband and I discovered this one summer when we traveled together. Every day we found ourselves frustrated because we kept doing things and then wishing we had done them differently. We left late and ended up hitting traffic. We chose to go to a remote beach and then had to navigate unexpectedly rough roads. And so on and so on. But more difficult than the traffic, rough roads, or anything else, was the constant rumination about what we should have done.

So, at some point, we created a rule that we can’t use the words “should have” for the next week. Our trip became so much more enjoyable because we stopped focusing on what we wished we had done instead. We were able to just be in the present moment and build on mistakes constructively. We experienced much less stress and arguments after that.

To become a confident decision-maker, we simply must learn to be at peace with our choices. Mistakes are inevitable, so choose either to grow from them or accept that you made the best decision at the time and move on. Stop breaking trust with yourself and your judgment with regret. Accept the choices you’ve made and add your “learnings” to your toolbox for you to draw from as you continue to gain more experience in life.

Learn How to Weigh Advice

While most of this article focused on making choices independently, having people around you whom you trust to turn to for advice is important. It’s often a critical part of the information-gathering process. It’s valuable to receive insights from those close to you whose values align closely with your own.

Just remember that you are the one who lives with the consequences of your own decisions. So it’s your responsibility to take ownership of your own choices. Even the most thoughtful and trusted people in our lives may still choose a different path than the one that would be best for us personally. This is natural because we all have our own unique needs to consider. While advice can be a valuable treasure, weigh it carefully to ensure that your choices align with your priorities. 

Final Thoughts on Self-Reliance

There is great freedom in learning to develop a healthy sense of self-reliance. Not only does it help you gain clarity on your values, but it gives you the conviction to pursue them. There will be times when you’re faced with a choice that others might not understand. But by building your skills and confidence, you’ll have greater peace of mind with the path you choose. If you’re interested in watching a short video on this topic, I recommend this 1950’s social guide video on developing self-reliance. It’s a wholesome video that does a great job illustrating just how building these skills can lead to a successful and fulfilling life.

What are ways that you have learned to become a confident decision-maker in your own life? Are there any pain points in this article that you’ve struggled with personally? I would love to know in the comments.