How To Make A Decision

How do you make a decision when offered an opportunity? Why do you make the decisions that you make? This live talk is an effort to offer a spiritual perspective on how to make decisions. Originally titled What To Do When You Don't Know What To Do by Josh Reeves.

Transcript

What to do when you don't know what to do?

I go back to the ancient Chinese philosopher,

Xuangzi.

Xuangzi was living in the forest,

And a group of the king's cabinet came to see him in order to ask him if he would become the chief advisor to the king.

Xuangzi said,

Is it true that the king has a golden turtle?

Yes,

The king does.

It's the most beautiful,

Magnificent,

Giant tortoise you've ever seen with a shell made of gold,

And the king keeps the turtle in the finest box you've ever seen up in his quarters.

Xuangzi replies,

Fellas,

Would you rather be a golden turtle up in a box in the king's quarters,

Or would you rather be a turtle right here in the swamp,

Dragging his tail in the mud?

They all agree that they'd probably rather be the turtle dragging his tail in the mud.

Xuangzi replies,

You go back to your king,

And I'm going to stay here,

Dragging my tail in the mud.

An important spiritual practice to spend that time.

It's always a good reminder for me to ask myself before I say yes to an opportunity,

Am I doing it for prestige?

Am I doing it to people please?

Am I protecting that time that allows me to enjoy my life and what's most important to me?

When an opportunity comes up,

I try to ask the following questions.

Is it mine to do?

Could someone do it better than me?

Could I delegate it?

Am I the right person to do what's being offered me?

Second,

Is it in alignment with my mission and purpose,

Where I'm going in my life and with what I want to do?

Lastly,

Do I have the time I need to do it successfully?

I'm always forgetting that last one.

How about you?

I love how the great Christian author Frederick Buechner talked about purpose.

He said that your purpose is all about matching up your joy with something the world needs.

So that if your job,

He says,

Is writing TV deodorant commercials,

It may be something that you enjoy very much,

Yet it may not be doing much good in the world.

That's an arguable point,

I understand.

You may be a doctor in a leper colony doing great work in the world,

But not expressing that joy in your heart.

So he concludes that the place that God calls you to is that place where your deep gladness and the world's hunger meet.

How important it is to drag our tail in the mud so that we can get in touch with that deep gladness and trust that it's going to call us to write what the world may be looking for or to offer for us.

It's good to pause when given an opportunity and to say,

Am I doing this because it's mine to do or am I doing this to please the person who's asking me to do it?

Am I doing this because it's aligned with my mission and purpose or am I doing it because it helps promote a facade of mine?

It helps give me a sense of prestige.

It helps make me that gold turtle in the box somewhere.

Am I doing it because I know I have the time needed to do it successfully?

Or am I saying yes because I'm afraid of saying no?

How many of us get trapped in routines and chores that aren't ours to do simply because we're afraid to say no to doing what we're most called to do?

Of all the opportunities that we have in our lives,

I also want to talk tonight about those challenges that come up for us,

Where they're yes or no decisions.

Should I end this relationship or should I renew it?

Should I quit my job or should I ask for a promotion?

Should I share with someone that something they said hurt my feelings or bothered me?

Should I choose to have this courageous conversation with so-and-so or should I hold back?

Anyone in any of those situations right now that we experienced?

It's not an easy decision and I can't tell you what to do,

But what I do want to point out is sometimes we limit ourselves by thinking that the only choice is yes or no or do or not do.

There's actually two other choices that can come up that can be very consequential.

One can be incredibly destructive and one that I'll wind up talking about can be incredibly powerful.

The one that can be incredibly destructive is inaction or not choosing.

Sometimes we forget that not choosing is a choice in itself with its own consequences.

Sometimes we deny or try not to make a choice because we're afraid or because we're in a lot of anxiety,

Or because we're afraid about how someone's going to respond.

So we hold in that place and I tell you there's nothing more miserable than being in that place of inaction.

I have a beautiful younger sister,

Her name is Mallory,

And I'll always remember she graduated with her bachelor's degree and she got this incredible scholarship offer to go to college in Ireland.

Neither of us had hardly left Southern California at the time.

So it was a big opportunity for her and she was terrified.

I saw her just for weeks wrestling in the state of inaction.

You know there's this space between opportunity and choice.

The choice we make in that space can so much dictate not only the course and the direction of our lives and how the universe comes about to support us,

But our own mental,

Spiritual,

And emotional state.

So I did what any good older brother I thought would do at the time.

I took her to a bar and we went out on the patio and we had a drink there.

I just encouraged her.

I saw how she was suffering.

Mallory,

I'm not saying you have to choose now,

But what do you want?

What do you really want to do?

She lit up and she said,

Yes,

I'm going to Ireland.

I'm going to school.

We talked for a while and it wasn't two minutes when these tall,

Beautiful women came and sat next to us at a separate table.

My sister and I were talking and I kept hearing in these girls,

They had these accents.

So I couldn't help but say,

Hi,

My name is Josh.

Who are you?

Where are you from?

They were all soccer players in town from Belfast,

Ireland.

The very place where she was going to go to school.

So it's interesting when we finally do make that choice to know that the universe and all of its mysteries and all of its creative intelligence can bring us these little signs of validation.

It can help us recognize that whether you choose yes or no,

It's going to be the right choice because you're going to make it the right choice for you.

But when we're in that state of inaction,

It doesn't matter how powerful the universe is around us,

It can only bring us that experience that sometimes feels so empty and so suffering because we know we're doing the opposite of living our life when we're in that place of inaction.

A lot of us have experienced the consequences of that kind of inaction in our lives.

See,

When we don't choose for ourselves,

Someone or something else chooses for us.

Have you found that true?

When you don't choose for yourself,

Something or someone else will choose for you.

Don't ask the guy out and someone else does.

You don't apply for the job and someone else does and gets it.

You don't do whatever it is that you're called to and something comes in and takes its place,

And there you are in that place of emptiness.

A lot of us could define a lot of the challenges,

The inward suffering in our life to this inhibition because once you get into inaction,

You're scared to do anything and it can roll on for years or sometimes even decades in our lives.

So my advice for those of us who may even find ourselves there today is,

Make those little actions,

Make those little yeses.

Maybe you don't have the muster to ask the guy out,

But ask a friend at work out to coffee.

Maybe you aren't ready to apply for that new job,

But maybe you're ready to create that LinkedIn account or whatever it may be.

Maybe you're not ready to have that courageous conversation,

But maybe you can show up and be willing to have that conversation.

So inaction is that dangerous third choice of not choosing.

The worst in my opinion that we can ever make for ourselves and our lives because it's choosing or not choosing from a place of distrust.

But there's this fourth kind of choosing that to me is quite powerful and it can be a little confusing semantically because it's the opposite of inaction.

Anyone want to guess what it is?

It's non-action for me,

Kevin.

Yeah.

Thank you.

It's non-action.

It's there's one thing to unconsciously choose not choosing,

And then there's this choice where you consciously not choose.

Where from a place of trusting the process and embodying your virtue,

You courageously go right up to the choice and embody that virtue,

And trust that spirit will reveal the next step to take whatever it is.

Can you imagine that involves some courage,

Doesn't it?

To maybe not know what the truth is about something,

But to know that it is,

And that by embodying the best of yourself,

It can show up.

So this isn't the way of inaction where we stay in fear and anxiety,

It's a way of trust where we actually embody a kind of patience,

Embody the best in ourselves,

And demonstrate it all around us.

I love a quote from one of the great American leaders,

Abraham Lincoln.

He said,

A man watches his pear tree day after day,

Impatient for the ripening of the fruit.

Let him attempt to force the process and he may spoil both fruit and tree.

But let him patiently wait and the ripe pear at length falls into his lap.

So that's a great statement about non-action,

About not needing to force the process,

But trusting the process to see the opportunities that come up.

Lincoln was a master of non-action,

But he was a master of action as well.

The Emancipation Proclamation for example.

So when we're able to embody a kind of trust that knows the universe is at work for us,

And clarifying what we want,

It's amazing how all the creative elements of life can come together to create great demonstrations for who we are and for what we want.

When you're choosing non-action,

The question is never,

What is mine to do?

The question is always,

Who am I called to become?

The question is never,

What am I to do?

But who am I called to become?

I don't know if I'm breaking up with my partner or not,

But I'm going to talk with them,

And I'm going to embody a state of love and willingness to forgive.

I don't know if I'm going to quit my job,

But I'm going to embrace courage and honesty and integrity when I talk to my boss about my lack of certainty about what to do.

I'm going to go see my friend that hurt me,

And I don't know yet if I'm going to tell him that,

But I'm going to trust that there may be an opening or a possibility to bring forth what is there to share within me.

This way of non-action is an opportunity to live our lives from a place of deep trust,

And then it infuses our yeses and our nos.

Inaction makes them seem scary and frightening,

But when we embrace non-action,

Yeses and nos,

It becomes the ways that we move into our lives.

Some of you may have heard me say this before,

That your yeses in your life are your offense.

They're what you move all the little choices you make towards achieving your goals and your good,

But in the game of life,

Your nos are your defense,

And your nos are how you protect those yeses.

So when it comes to whatever opportunity may be before you,

With whatever uncertainty you may have in a relationship,

A financial situation,

A work situation,

A life itself situation,

See if you can't,

Before you say yes or no,

Embrace that state of non-action and begin like a turtle dragging its tail in the mud,

To cultivate that sense of life and beingness.

Then when you approach that which you are seeking to make the right choice,

You will no longer fear it,

But you will have already been there in consciousness when you arrive,

And you can begin to trust and work with spirit to make the highest and best choice for you and yourself.

Just as a way of closing since I invoked the great Schwinge.

I'm just going to read a couple of quotes from his philosophy inspired by Taoism.

If you'd like,

You can go within or just hang out just like you are.

He says,

To find the Tao,

There is nowhere you need to search.

If it's not inside you,

It is not the Tao.

Thus,

In dealing with people,

You already have the perfect model of behavior inside you.

Just act with integrity according to your true nature.

Don't do to others what you wouldn't want done to you.

Though the Tao is the realest of the real,

It has no form or substance.

It can be pointed to but not seen,

Embodied but not achieved.

It is its own source,

Its own root.

It is above all things,

Yet it isn't lofty.

Beneath all things,

Yet it isn't slow.

Thus,

The master isn't fooled by appearances.

She honors the genuine wherever it appears.

Just to say that,

And some of you know I have a practice called the Tao of Spirit.

So I'm just going to change this word Tao to spirit,

And see if we can hear it in a different way.

To find the spirit,

There is nowhere you need to search.

If it is not inside you,

It is not the spirit.

Though the spirit is the realest of the real,

It has no form or substance.

The spirit can be pointed to but not seen,

Embodied but not achieved.

Spirit is its own source.

Spirit is its own root.

Spirit is above all things,

Yet it isn't lofty.

Beneath all things,

Yet spirit isn't low.

Thus,

You aren't fooled by appearances.

You honor the genuine wherever it appears.

So just taking a moment to find that place of the genuine within ourselves.

How we're feeling,

Who we are,

Right here and right now in this now moment,

Without judgment or reconciliation,

Resentment,

Or you ought to be doing this or that.

May we just be with that pure spirit within ourselves,

Trusting that by allowing ourselves fully to come present to it right now,

It has all the guidance and wisdom to give us.

Just at the right moment,

All we need to be all that we are,

That demonstrates all that we are to do.

May we do it as natural as the flow of a river,

As natural as a tortoise,

Dragging its tail in that mud,

Enjoying its life,

Being its nature,

And bringing forth the best of itself.

Reviews

Thank you

Beautifully articulated. Grounding. Centering. Thank you 🙏

I opened this talk with the hopes of learning how to decide my next steps in life where to go to live or to work and to find community. I think I got more signs of alignment than I had anticipated from this talk and from spirit. specifically the story of the speaker’s sister’s indecision about going to Ireland strongly resonates with me as that is a decision I’m trying to make at the moment.

Really good reminders. Thank you

💚🙏🌱

Absolutely brilliant! Thank you so much…

How beautiful! Just what I needed today. Thank you.

Excellent advice.

So much wisdom, succinct & accessible. Thank You.