It does not look that stupid, when you are a part of it

Punam said...
Dear thinking writer,why don't you write something on a subject like instinct, gut feeling and decision making? this is a very intriguing topic and I am unable to think through.I look forward to your views on this.

It does not look that stupid, when you are a part of it

I know I may not exactly writing what punam asked me to. This is a view I conceived a long back & it relates with GUT feeling & decision making.

I always looked at the choices people make & every time I figured out a better choice. Surprisingly it always appeared like obvious to me too. That makes me feel if I am better in decision making than all of them or they are plain dumb.

The finding keep me bothered for a long time.Why people don't see the real big picture & why do they take half hearted decisions? Slowly but surely I found out that being there is completely different than reading or thinking about it".I realized they are not plain dumb & even I was not that smart. But that never meant that I took it as it was.

I decided to challenge it. I have seen people taking good decisions, I admit only a few of them but they do take it.

I dig a little deep into it & I found that the more important a decision becomes for me, More foolishly will I behave.Somehow, somewhere I as a human has developed a tendency of taking bad decisions when they matter most.You should ask If that's what we do then why do those decisions work for us. It's really simple, almost always taking a decision is much more important than taking a right decision.That's why they worked. But just because they worked it does not mean we stop looking for better.

I starved for reason & I found it. I will state it as

"When you go too close to a problem, you become a part of the problem"

When you get attached emotionally,physically or mentally with a situation, you lose your ability to see & understand the things in the way you saw them normally. Our senses do interfere with our ability to make a decision. At that point we do two things simultaneously

1. Thinking about how to solve the problem
2. Relating our good & bad experiences (including about people involved with solution) with the problem & becoming a part of the problem slowly, surely

Now as we are slowly getting attached to the problem If you solve it quickly, it would be easier. I have seen people taking quick decisions & yes it is effective.

You stop thinking about it & just take a decision by getting completely associated with the problem i.e. by using your gut feeling. I saw people employing that . It is effective too.

Third & most unexplored part is to get abstracted from the problem. See it not as a person who is solving it but as a observer who is observing someone solve that problem.

It is right that " It does not look that stupid when you are a part of it". So the most efficient way is to get out of the scene all of a sudden & see what are you doing. Be the third person & analyze if its the right choice.Yes its not me better than you.It never was.I saw that third person always takes a better decision.

That's why having a hierarchy in a company makes sense. The third person can see & solve your problems in a better way than you can be. So whenever you can't solve a problem you approach him & most of the time he gives you a solution & you say he is good. Unfortunately he is not that good,but the reason making him good is good. He is just a third person, emotionally detached from the scene. He can see the problem in your solution finding approach as it is not his approach.

If you can see your approach in that way.then that's the key of problem solving & decision making.

"Don't be a part of it. You will notice the stupidity".

Arpit