Episode 1084: Seven Questions to Ask When Deciding

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Thanks for joining me on episode 1084 of the inspired stewardship podcast.

[00:00:07] Wayne Titus: I'm Wayne Titus author of the entrepreneur's guide to financial wellbeing. I encourage you to be inspired, to become a better steward through financial wisdom. By listening to this, the inspired stewardship podcast with my friend, Scott.

[00:00:22] Scott Maderer: again, none of these questions actually have right or wrong answers. The idea behind this is simply using this to mentally go through a checklist and think about where you fit in on the various feelings and thoughts around the decision.

[00:00:40] Welcome and thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcast. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true calling and the inspired stewardship podcast who will learn to invest in yourself, [00:01:00] invest in others and develop your influence so that you can.

[00:01:06] The word

[00:01:07] and today's episode about investing in others through stewarding your talent. I talk with you about seven questions that you can ask to help make decisions. I share why asking these questions can help clarify even when it's a hard decision. And I also share why we often don't ask ourselves questions like these.

[00:01:26] You've heard me talk about developing your team. And what are the best ways to do that is through books. But if you're like most people today, it's hard to find the time to read. And that's why today's podcast is brought to you by audible. Go to inspired stewardship.com/audible to sign up and you can get a 30 day free trial.

[00:01:48] There's over 180,000 titles to choose from. And you can pick one and listen your way to developing your talents via. That's inspired [00:02:00] stewardship.com/audible to get your free trial and listen to great books the same way you're listening to this podcast. One of the things that can happen to a lot of us is when we have a decision to make, especially a big decision, or when we're trying to make a decision while we're under stress or tired or other things is we get locked up in the sort of decision making dilemma where we don't want to make a decision because we don't feel like we know what the right decision is.

[00:02:31] And what I've found is there are some questions that you can sit down and ask yourself that. Don't necessarily make the decision for you, but begin to make it a little easier to make a decision and move forward because oftentimes making a decision is better than not making a decision. Even if the decision you make isn't quote the perfect one.

[00:02:56] So let's think about what these seven [00:03:00] questions. The first one is asking about regret. If I don't do this now, will I regret it? It's trying to put yourself into a future mindset of looking back and saying, is this a short of thing that in the past, when I've put off this kind of decision, I've ended up regretting that I didn't make a decision on it more quickly.

[00:03:22] Because the truth is usually there's a pattern to the kinds of decisions that you make. And so recognizing that maybe I've actually got more experience with this kind of decision that I think can help us move forward. The second question, what am I afraid of? What is keeping you stuck out of this decision making because of a fear of success or a fear of failure, what is it that you're actually worried about?

[00:03:51] And by the way, I write the answers to these questions because doing this in writing also helps your brain process. [00:04:00] The third question, what is your gut say? Or what does your heart say? What does your emotions say about this? Try to get out of the rational for a minute and think emotionally for a second.

[00:04:11] What does your gut say? Because sometimes that intuition is more right than we might think. Number four. What am I really doing this for? Is this something that you're doing for yourself or for others? Is this something you're doing because you want to do it, or because others want you to do it by the way, neither one of those is necessarily a good or a bad answer.

[00:04:35] It's just about identifying the reasons behind why you feel like you're being pushed towards a decision here. Who are you really making this decision? And the second, the next part of that is what are you really doing it for? So not only who, but what is the end goal that you're after? What are the results that you're trying to get?

[00:04:58] What are you hoping [00:05:00] for as an outcome and the sixth? Would I like myself after making this decision, if you decide a certain way, will you somehow feel bad about it? Will you feel like you're an uncaring person or you're not living out your values in some way? And the last one, the seventh is can I deal with the fallout?

[00:05:22] Meaning if you're telling your boss no to something. Is that going to cause fallout. And are you willing to deal with it if you're telling a significant other? No. Is that going to cause fallout and are you able and willing to deal with it again, none of these questions actually have right or wrong answers.

[00:05:41] The idea behind this is simply using this to mentally go through a checklist and think about where you fit in on the various feelings and thoughts around. As you check into it. A lot of times what ends up happening is [00:06:00] one of the decisions that you've been putting off suddenly becomes more clear what the answer should be, and you're able to make a decision and move forward more effectively.

[00:06:11] Thanks for listening.

[00:06:12] Thanks so much for listening to the inspired stewardship podcast. As a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you liked this episode on the stewardship of talent, you can go over to inspired stewardship.com/talent inside.

[00:06:39] For our five week series on the stewardship of talent, or if you're in the U S you can text 4, 4, 2, 2, 2 talent tips. That's talent tips to 4 4, 2, 2, 2, and get those tips until next time, invest your time, your talent [00:07:00] and your treasures. Develop your influence and impact the world.